


bring me to light

by safflowerseason



Category: Veep (TV)
Genre: Death in the Family, F/M, Future Fic, Gen, Parenting and Politics, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2019-09-23 23:18:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 89,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17089631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/safflowerseason/pseuds/safflowerseason
Summary: Amy's dad dies. Dan has to try and be a human about it, when all he really wants to do is go home and fall asleep on the couch while his kid watches The Lion King for the two-hundredth time. Fuck. When did this become his life?Future fic that takes place in the spring of 2025. AU from season six.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This story was conceived and mostly drafted over the summer, before any of the behind-the-scenes photos and press articles were released, which have strongly hinted at certain plot points for season seven. As a result, some elements in this story may already be more "AU", while others (in the abstract, at least) may not yet be.

August 4, 2019

_Politico_

**Meyer Campaign Strategist on Maternity Leave**  
****

Amy Brookheimer, President Meyer’s longtime aide and senior strategist, gave birth to her first child over the weekend. President Meyer released a statement this morning:

_I warmly congratulate my colleague Amy Brookheimer on the birth of her child. Ms. Brookheimer is an essential member of Team Meyer, and we look forward to welcoming her back upon the conclusion of her maternity leave. I urge the press to respect her privacy during this cherished period for mother and baby._

Ms. Brookheimer’s pregnancy caused a flurry of press attention in Washington this spring when she was first photographed at a Meyer Foundation event with a visible baby bump. President Meyer, however, turned the potential scandal into an opportunity to speak about equality for women in the workplace, incorporating multiple visits to women’s colleges and female-run corporations into her “Feelings Tour” of America.

Ms. Brookheimer, who is unmarried, has not publicly confirmed the identity of the baby’s father, although the Washington press widely assumes it to be Dan Egan, fellow senior strategist for President Meyer’s campaign. Mr. Egan is also part-owner of BKD, the political consultancy he co-founded with Washington veterans Ben Cafferty and Kent Davison. President Meyer hired the firm in January, a move that strongly hinted at her renewed interest in a second presidential run.

Rumors of an on-and-off-again relationship have dogged Ms. Brookheimer and Mr. Egan since President Hughes’ administration. The pair have been frequently sighted together since Ms. Brookheimer’s pregnancy became public knowledge.

President Meyer is expected to announce her second campaign for the presidency later this month. This morning, she attended a pancake breakfast at a retirement community in Manchester, New Hampshire. Mr. Egan was not present at the event.

*

November 9, 2020 - 4:45am

_The New York Times BREAKING NEWS ALERT_

**Another Historic Election Loss for Meyer: Montez Clings to the Presidency with 538 Electoral Votes**

A historic election on all fronts: a presidential race fought between two women, both of them fighting for re-election, and the closest electoral vote count in recent memory. 

By 2:30am on Election Night, it was clear that President Montez would just barely manage to hold on to the presidency, with a win in Oregon clinching a narrow margin of victory. President Meyer had actually pulled ahead in the race, and according to reports, was confident that Oregon would deliver her the presidency. 

President Meyer’s daughter, animal-rights activist Catherine Meyer appeared around 3am to address a chastened crowd, announcing that her mother had conceded the election to President Montez and would address her supporters in the morning. Observers remarked to the _Times_ that Ms. Meyer appeared surprisingly serene with what surely must have been a crushing blow to her family’s political ambitions. 

 _This is a breaking story: please check back for updates._  

*

November 10, 2020

_The New Hampshire Union Leader_

**Youngest-Ever Governor Jonah Ryan Pledges To “Put New Hampshire on the F*@king Map”**

A new governor has arrived in Manchester. Jonah Ryan swept to triumph with a record 80% of the state's vote as youngest governor in American history. Ryan entered the race at the last minute, fresh off a defeat in the presidential primaries by Selina Meyer. 

Ryan, who briefly served in Congress, ran an anti-establishment campaign bolstered by a viral internet presence and aggressive rhetoric that drew many young voters to him. 

“We’re extremely pleased by the turnout in voters under the age of 35.” campaign strategist Bill Ericsson told the _Union Leader_. “Jonah Ryan is going to clean up politics in this state, and he’s got the support of the most vital voting demographic in the—

_continued on page A5_

*

February 15, 2021

_Politico Playbook_

**SPOTTED:** Amy Brookheimer in a closed-door meeting with newly elected Senator of New York, Elizabeth Halliday. A veteran whose husband is still on active duty, and the mother of two young children, Halliday is regarded as a rising star in the party, charismatic and down-to-earth. She’s joined the Senate Committees for Intelligence and Veterans Affairs. 

Since President Meyer’s second election loss in November, Brookheimer has kept a low profile. She’s been widely expected to take a position at BKD, the consulting firm co-managed by rumored fiancé Dan Egan, although no official announcement has been made. 

*

October 1, 2021

_Politico Playbook_

**SPOTTED:** President Meyer at the Global Climate Task-Force Summit in Buenos Aires in the company of her close friend Minna Häkkinen, ex-prime minister of Finland and “fellow sister-ally in the pursuit of democracy and equality,” as Häkkinen told reporters.

Since her second failed presidential bid, Meyer has remained mostly out of the public eye, reportedly focused on building up the international profile of the Meyer Foundation. According to insider sources, she plans to re-brand herself as a global goodwill ambassador, working with various political organizations to secure world peace.

This past summer, Meyer briefly reunited with her ex-husband, commercial real estate tycoon Andrew Meyer, but has formally cut ties with him since he pled guilty to charges of tax fraud in September.

*

November 5, 2022 - 11:15pm

_Axios_

**Montez Checked: Dramatic Gains in House and Senate Imperil Her Agenda**

It’s been a bad night for President Montez as she watched overwhelming opposition to her administration crystallize into a veritable rush on the voting booth. With her polling numbers as low as they’ve ever been, she can expect to spend the next two years fighting the constraints of a lame duck presidency.

The mood is grim inside the White House currently. Chief-of-Staff Candi Caruso is prepared to offer her resignation in the wake of such a crushing defeat.

Needless to say, it is a jubilant night for the other side. Roger Furlong has been sighted in the Rayburn Building breaking out the champagne, although the final vote counts have yet to be tallied.

_This is a breaking story: please check back for updates._

*

December 20, 2022

_People.com/tags/celebrity_politics_

**SPOTTED:** Washington’s hottest power couple, Amy Brookheimer and Dan Egan, out Christmas shopping with their daughter in Georgetown. Click **here** for details about Amy’s outfit.

*

February 14, 2023

_The New Yorker_

**King-Makers: The Three Men Who Elected the 117th Congress**

Election Night 2022 was a good night for Ben Cafferty, Kent Davison, and Dan Egan. The trio sat in their glass-walled office on K-Street and watched the results on CNN, surrounded by staff, a tangled web of phone lines, and Mr. Davison’s groundbreaking polling software.

“Oh, it was a very good night. I knew it was going to change everything,” says Mr. Egan, who oversees the consultancy’s media operations.

A record number of their clients were successful in their election or reelection bids, including major congressional power players Roger Furlong and Barbara Hallowes, not to mention a trifecta of governors from Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. 

The firm struggled in its first two years, backing President Meyer’s failed bid for re-election, but after 2020, the team shook off the defeat and focused on the future.

“Yes, we do plan to expand our operation.” demures Mr. Davison, the self-professed mathematician behind the operation. “We believe it is now financially viable do so, and, in fact, are interested in—"

“Jesus, Kent, this is an interview, not an investment pitch.” interrupts Mr. Cafferty from behind his newspaper.

“And we’ve got Oscar and Felix over here,” Mr. Egan says to me in a stage-whisper, a trademark smirk lighting up his face.

But how did these three men meet, and what’s the story behind their successful collaboration? No other alliance of Washington insiders have held so much influence outside of Congress or the White House since the days of Gerald Ford. The firm has recently opened a foreign consulting division, managed by Mr. Cafferty, and Mr. Davison has plans to extend his polling “Dream Metric” operation to cover an entire second floor, which would leave Mr. Egan to run the bulk of the team’s domestic portfolio.

“I mean, the name is objectively terrible,” Amy Brookheimer, Mr. Egan’s fiancée and Senator Elizabeth Halliday’s chief of staff, commented sardonically by phone. “But it doesn’t seem to have prevented anyone from trusting their expertise.”

Mr. Cafferty, the consigliere of the trio, first came to Washington in the mid-seventies—

_continued on page 3_

*

April 19, 2023

_Vanity Fair_

**See all the outfits from the White House Correspondents Dinner** \- Click **here** for gallery.

Dan Egan, Washington power broker and frequent CNN commentator, in a tuxedo by Tom Ford. His fiancée, political strategist Amy Brookheimer wore a two-toned emerald and silver gown by Escada, and jewelry by Harry Winston.

*

September 4, 2023

_Politico Playbook_

**Longtime Washington Couple Wed in Private Ceremony; NH Governor Calls Their Relationship “Super Lame”**

Amy Brookheimer and Dan Egan officially tied the knot in a spontaneous courthouse wedding in New Hampshire this past Tuesday.

On Wednesday morning, Mr. Egan’s representative released a single photograph of the ceremony, confirming the rumors. Mr. Egan posted a different photo on his personal Instagram and Twitter accounts later that day. The couple’s young daughter was the only family member in attendance.

The news was greeted with surprise in Washington. Ms. Brookheimer has always remained notoriously private about her personal life in contrast to the more gregarious Mr. Egan, who often posts about Ms. Brookheimer and their daughter on his popular social media accounts. But even those closest to the couple had no inkling of any plans to wed.

Most unusually, the news has drawn ire from New Hampshire governor Jonah Ryan, as the statement diverted national and local press attention away from Ryan’s announcement of his second presidential campaign.

“Amy and I dated back when she worked for me during Hughes’s first term. It’s super lame to see the trash she’s had to settle for since I broke up with her. Also, Dan’s not actually from New York City but he lets everyone think he is,” Ryan tweeted early this morning.

Both Mr. Egan and Ms. Brookheimer declined to comment, although Ben Cafferty, caught on his way into the BKD offices this morning, called the tweet “typically bonkers”, and suggested that Ryan focus instead on his state’s looming budget crisis.

*

August 14, 2024

_The Wall Street Journal_

**Two Blondes in the Hart Building Shake Up Washington**

_continued from page 4_

-heimer has steered the Senator through tricky political waters. Senator Halliday, who still insists on being called “Liz” by close friends and staffers, was recently thrust even further into the spotlight by the unexpected death of her senior colleague in January of 2022. The loss ofSenator Blakeley propelled Halliday, barely two years into her first term, to an unprecedented position of influence as the senior senator of one of the most populous states in the nation. Ms. Brookheimer’s task, as insiders saw it, was to capitalize on a once-in-a-lifetime twist of fate in order to solidify Halliday’s place as a national figure.

Ms. Brookheimer previously carved her own distinctive path through Washington, as the first female Chief of Staff to a sitting Vice President, and the youngest individual to ever hold the position. One of President Meyer’s most loyal aides, Ms. Brookheimer was at her side during the most critical moments of the former president’s career, including her sudden ascendance to the presidency in 2015 and both of her dramatic election losses.

After the 2020 election, Ms. Brookheimer was recruited by Halliday. Of course, she brought not only her own expertise to Halliday’s operation, but also her connections to a valuable network of Washington power brokers, most notably her husband. Ms. Brookheimer is married to political consultant Dan Egan, another former member of the Meyer Administration,  whose firm now retains Halliday as a client.

In the run-up to the election, rumors circulated that Halliday was considering a presidential run. Neither the Senator nor her chief of staff ever confirmed or spoke publicly about a possible campaign. Nevertheless, Halliday remains a hot commodity on the campaign trail, a potent fundraising presence currently in-demand by congressional candidates across the country, especially in light of the current nominee’s polarizing rhetoric—

_continued on page 6_

*

April 2, 2025

_The Maryland Gazette_

**Obituaries**

Mark Vernon Brookheimer passed away on March 21, 2025. He was born on February 10, 1956 in Rockville, Maryland, the oldest of three brothers and two sisters. He and his wife Anne were high school sweethearts. Mark graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in civil engineering, and worked for KCW Engineering Technologies for the entirety of his career.

He was a deeply devoted husband and father, protective yet fiercely loving and supportive. Mark’s favorite hobbies included fly-fishing, watching classic films, playing checkers and chess, and visiting the Chesapeake frequently to dine on his favorite meal, soft-shelled crab. Most of all, he loved being a grandfather. He will be profoundly missed by all his family, and we will carry his memory in our hearts forever.

Mark is survived by his beloved wife Anne; his daughter Sophie; his daughter Amy and her husband Dan Egan; and his four grandchildren.

There will be a funeral service commemorating Mark on Saturday, April 5th at White Cross Episcopal Church in Chevy Chase, Maryland.

*


	2. Chapter One

* * *

 

did I just hear an alarm start ringing?

did I see sirens go flying past?

\- jason robert brown, _the last five years_

 

* * *

Mark Brookheimer dies of a pulmonary embolism on a spring morning in late March.

His second daughter, Amy Brookheimer, is the chief of staff for Senator Elizabeth Halliday, senior senator from New York and likely presidential candidate in 2028.

His youngest granddaughter, Cassidy Brookheimer Egan, known to her family and friends as Cassie, Cass, or Cassie B, can recite the names of the nine Supreme Court judges in addition to having just learned to write her name. She knows all the words to _The Star-Spangled Banner_ and in her short life has already visited thirty two out of the fifty states. 

As for his son-in-law….well, Mr. Brookheimer tried never to think about his son-in-law if he could help it. 

*

The cherry blossoms were out. Not that Dan gives a crap about cherry blossoms—there's more fucking tourists to avoid downtown—but his daughter kept bringing home cherry-blossom themed projects from school, blurry watercolors and short poems and tissue-paper “diagrams”, so it stuck out in his mind later. They even had a miniature cherry tree growing on their back patio as some kind of class-wide science project. Amy was sending her assistant home every day to water it, although theoretically they were supposed to teach Cassidy how to take care of a plant or some bullshit like that, which obviously neither he or Amy had any damn time for. Kindergarten is fucking advanced these days, if you ask Dan. 

It was a regular morning. Dan got up first, went for a run, got back in time to “surprise” Amy in the shower. During breakfast, CNN in the background, Cassidy rambled excitedly about her class’s upcoming field trip to the natural history museum. Over her head, Dan and Amy discussed the ongoing fight over the party’s proposed health care overhaul. Amy’s boss (and Dan’s client) Liz Halliday was a co-sponsor of the bill.

“Oh yeah, I’m stopping at the hospital during lunch.” Amy had said, an afterthought, like it was nothing, like it was casual. “Dad has some tests, and I said I’d meet him.”

“Mmm.” Dan had replied, not really listening, one eye on the tv and the other one on Cassidy, making sure she didn’t spill anything on her clothes. 

“Cassie, you want me to give one of your pictures to Grandpa? I think he’d love one.”

“And we get to see the butterfl—yes please!”

Amy deftly yanked one of the nine identical cherry blossom watercolors off the refrigerator and tucked it into her bag. 

“The bill—I need you to—“

“Get on Kasinski, yeah, we will—Cassie, what are you doing to your toast?”

“I’m _trying_ to make it look like a butterfly. Because of the museum. _Duh._ ” 

“How about…” Dan pulled an exaggerated thinking face, which Cassidy imitated right back at him, “…you _eat_ it like a normal person, because we have to leave in ten minutes.” 

“Where’s my briefing folder on Canadian pharmaceutical pricing?”

“—I have no idea—”

“—You were looking at it last night—”

“—I put it back wherever it was—” 

Cassidy laughed. “Daddy hid Mommy’s homework.” 

“ _Ughh._ ” Amy darted out of the kitchen, looking her usual amount of manically frantic for a Friday morning. Dan started piling coffee mugs into the sink, and his phone rang. “Yeah, Kent, I saw the email from Pierce, have Melissa put him in my office with a chew-toy or something until I get there, Christ, it’s barely seven thirty.”

Amy hopped back into the kitchen, one high-heel in hand, the other on her foot, and a blue folder clutched in her teeth. “Omjmafeoing” 

Dan snorted around the phone. “What was that?” Amy took the folder out of her mouth and glared at him.

“Gross, _saliva._ ” Cassidy commented idly, from where she was studiously mixing the jam from her toast into her milk. 

“Okay, I’m going.” Amy announced, stepping into her other shoe, a bit breathless from the hopping. “Her lunch is in the fridge, don’t forget it.”

“Bye Mommy.” Cassidy sang out, standing up on her kitchen stool and nearly face-planting into the yoghurt. Dan, still on the phone, immediately grabbed her around the waist and swung her back to solid ground.

“Bye, Cassie.” Amy kissed her on the head. “Bye, you.” she tossed off in Dan’s direction.

“No kiss for me?” Dan said around a mouthful of Cassidy’s leftover toast. “Not you, Kent.” 

“Get me Kasinski and we’ll talk.”

“Naughty, Brookheimer,” Dan smirked. “Okay, Kent, call Kasinski and set up—“

“I am not your sex secretary.” Kent’s irritated voice echoed all over the kitchen. 

“You’ve got jam on your tie, Dan.”

“Oh shi- _ips._ ” They were trying to curse less around Cassidy ever since she got caught calling Christi Caruso a “fuckface” at school three weeks ago (hand to God, one of the proudest moments of Dan’s life), and pretty much failing miserably.

“You mean ‘shit’.” Cassidy giggled from the floor. “You owe me five dollars now.” 

“Shit.” Dan said again. “ _No,_ not you, Kent.” 

“Bribery?” Amy called exasperatedly from the front hallway. “We talked about—oh fuck it, I’ll call you later.” 

And that was the morning. 

*

By the time Dan changes his tie, fixes his hair, gathers up his things, gathers up all of _Cassidy’s_ things (why the fuck does one five year old need so much shit? She’s going to _kindergarten_ , not to fucking _space_ ), and herds her out the door into the car, they’re twenty minutes behind schedule. 

In the car they fight over the radio—Cassidy wants some mind-numbing podcast for kids, Dan wants the news—and she starts kicking the back of the front passenger seat in retaliation, which she _knows_ makes Dan crazy because it’s practically a brand-new car, they just got it at Christmas. When he tries to explain to her, eminently rational, that they’re in Daddy’s nice car and she’s supposed to treat it nicely, she sticks out her tongue and calls him a “shallow baby shell” presumably because she overheard Amy calling him “a shallow man-baby writer who can’t spell” the other night when they were working on a joint statement for Liz. 

On the last five minutes of the drive, he switches over to the oldies radio station, which perks her up, and he generously participates in the chorus of “Build Me Up, Buttercup” as they pull up into the drop-off line in front of the entrance to the lower school building. Kid’s got a semi-decent voice, Dan reflects to himself, wondering if music lessons are in the cards (immediately, Amy’s voice filters in through his brain— _for fuck’s sake, stop tallying all her potential life-skills_ ). 

Because they’re late, they’re stuck in the morning crush, crawling along in the line of sleek cars for a few minutes. Dan rolls down all the windows to allow them the maximum amount of visibility, which promptly backfires when he gets sucked into a conversation with a communications director over in Health and Human Services who wants to know why she hasn’t heard back from Halliday’s office about coordinating press events. 

“We’re just so eager to help out in any way with the upcoming vote—“

“Mmmm,” Dan replies mindlessly, thinking that he’s not Amy’s fucking secretary and mentally composing the text he’s going to send her to that fucking effect the second his hands are free. 

“And obviously I know how busy the Senator and her team must be right now, but—“

“Daddy!” Cassie flings herself up between the two front seats, hanging over the console and looking extremely put-out. “Drive, the bell just rang!”

“Oh shit, we gotta go—someone’ll call you soon, Becky.”

“No problem. Hi there, Cassie!” she calls cheerily through the window before hustling what looks like a posse of drooling preschoolers past the front of the car toward the front doors. Cassidy ignores her entirely.  

“ _G_ _o,_ move the car!”

“Calm down, kid, I can’t run over someone in the damn parking lot, they frown on that here.”

“Mommy would _honk_ at them.” Cassidy points out mutinously. 

When he finally pulls up into the designated drop-off space, Cassidy immediately grabs her backpack and pushes open the door, but she looks back at him expectantly, waiting for the usual information about who's going to pick her up when, as it changes day-to-day.

“Okay, me or Jessica will come get you tonight.” Jessica was their regular babysitter who had been demoted to on-call babysitter once Cassidy started kindergarten and could stay in extended-day until six in the evening. 

“Yep.”

“Have fun at the zoo.”

“ _Museum_.” Cassidy corrects him exasperatedly, in a killing imitation of Amy.

“Same difference.” 

She rolls her eyes at him but laughs as she hops out of the car. “Bye, Daddy.”

“Tell Ms. Browning I say hello!” he yells after her (Ms. Browning’s husband is an up-and-comer over in Education), but she’s already dashed for the big front doors. Dan watches her go, the bright red bow in her dark hair quickly disappearing in the crowd. The head of the lower school, greeting parents at the front doors, catches Dan’s eye and raises a hand in greeting. 

Someone honks behind him in the drop-off line. “What the hell, I’m _going,_ get a life, fucking soccer mom _…_ ” Still, he checks who it is in the rearview mirror before flipping them off (it’s nobody important). 

*

BKD’s already humming by the time Dan gets there, the offices bright and bustling. Kent’s down on the fifth floor, overseeing his polling minions and Ben’s yelling at someone on the phone in his office. Every time Dan steps off the elevator, he gets the same gleeful swell in his chest: _God, I’m so fucking powerful._

“Good morning, Mr. Egan.” Melissa, their receptionist, greets him from behind her computer monitor. “Senator Pierce is waiting for you. I just sent him in four minutes ago.”

“Well, let’s just hope he didn’t have an accident on the carpet.” 

“…What?” (Melissa’s new.)

“Nothing—Senator Pierce, what can I do for you this morning?”

Pierce’s sitting in front of Dan’s desk, right leg jiggling up and down. He’s their fucking neediest client by far, but he’s dumb enough to let BKD charge him a frankly criminal amount and now they basically own him since they got him elected as a Senator, so it’s a win-win for everyone

“Uh, hello, Dan, sorry I’m early, but, uh, I, you know, the health care reform bill, it’s just such, uh, um, a complex situation, and it’s keeping me up at night.” He glances nervously around the office as Dan unceremoniously tosses his things on the armchair in the corner.

“You mean the bill that’s currently polling at—“ Dan takes a seat and checks the most recent memo from Kent that’s sitting on top of a pile of color-coded polling data— “52 percent in the state of Nevada, and 64 percent nationally?”

Pierce shifts around. Jesus, he’s practically sweating. “Yes, um, well, certainly the _people_ like it.” 

The Halliday-McClain Accessible Health Care Reform Act was a descendant of Selina’s original Families First bill—except, as Amy liked to say, this version actually made sense. She and Liz had been working on it practically since Amy had gone to work for her four years ago. It proposed major reforms in the insurance and health care industries in order to lower costs. Its provisions included financial relief for veterans and families with disabled children and dependents. Opposition was vocal, but distinctly in the minority. It was going to push Halliday into national-hero territory and set her up to start prepping for a presidential run. All there was to do in the run-up was negotiate the smaller details and run as much as positive political PR as they could to scare the nay-sayers into voting for the bill.

There’s just one gigantic problem. 

Melissa pokes her head into the office. “Mr. Egan, I have the President on line 2—“

“Put him on hold.”

“Pardon?”

“Keep him on hold for as long as is humanly possible.” Ben calls out from the hallway, passing by with his mug. 

“Yeah, try and beat our last record of thirty seven minutes and fifty four seconds.” Dan adds.

“You, uh,” Pierce laughs nervously, “you don’t take the President’s calls?”

“Well, the President calls our office five times a day on average.” Dan replies, eyes on his own phone. “So I think he’ll stay on the line.”  

“Oh, right, of course, I imagine, especially in relation to this bill.”

They’ve been talking for a few more minutes when Pierce’s cell phone rings. He fumbles for it, but Dan has an idea of who’s on the other end. “Give it to me,” he demands, holding out a hand. Pierce turns it over to him without comment.

“Hello?”

An infuriatingly bright voice answers. “This is Richard Splett, I have President Ryan on the line for Senator Pierce.”

Immediately there's a loud, dramatic whisper in the background. “No, I don’t want to talk to Pierce, get me _Dan,_ I know he’s there, _damn it_ Richard!” 

And Jesus _fuck_ , this is something he’ll never, ever, get his head around—Jonah Ryan, the fucking President of the United States. 

“Richard, tell that electoral embarrassment you work for that if he really wants to get in touch with me, he can figure out how a fucking answering machine works.”

“Oh, Dan Egan!” Richard laughs, like it’s just the most delightful coincidence. “How’d that happen? I’m trying to reach Senator Pierce! Incidentally, is he in your vicinity?”

“For fuck’s sake—give me the _phone—“_ And then it’s Jonah’s voice shouting in his ear. “Dan, stop putting me on hold whenever I call your office!”

“Whoops.” Dan replies dryly. “Must be a technical glitch.” 

“You put me on _hold_ , Dan, and I am the literal President of the United States.” 

“In this dystopian fifth-dimension we’ve fallen into, yes you are.” Dan mutters through gritted teeth. Across the desk, Pierce stares at him and whispers “Oh my god, is that _really_ the President?”

“Oh by the way, did you get a new secretary? She sounds like she has a degree from the University of Phone-Sex.Com. Get it, Dan? Because the University of Pho _enix_ is an online university?” Dan can just imagine Jonah’s expression right now, that fucking maw of his twisted into a boorish smirk, endlessly pleased with him own mediocrity, and he has to physically resist the urge to hurl his phone at the wall (fucking glass).

“If you have to _explain_ the joke, it’s not a fucking good joke, Jonah. And stop sexually harrassing my receptionist, or I’ll get her and every female professional who has ever come into contact with you to file a class-action, and you’ll go down in history not only as our first mutant president, but also the one with the shortest term in office.” 

“What about—“

“And yeah, I’m fucking including Selina in that list.” 

“Well the joke’s on you Dan, you can’t fucking sue the President.” 

“Give it time, freakspawn. Now is there a reason you’re having your incompetent staff of professional wind-up dildos bother my clients?”

“I just wanted to tell you that I’m not going to vote for Amy’s lame-ass health-care bill.” Jonah says, sounding like a whiny four year old instead of the leader of the free world.

“Presidents don’t _vote_ for bills, they sign them, you sentient fucking skyscraper. And we fucking _know,_ you left her a voicemail yesterday at fucking 4am to tell him the same thing. What were you doing, up late playing _World of Warcraft_ in the Oval and arguing on Reddit about which Matrix sequel is the worst?”

“None of your business, Dan, because I only invite my _real_ friends to the White House. And I’m not going to do whatever you want me to do with Amy’s bill, you can’t make me.”

“You realize if you veto it, it’ll look like you’re doing it because your girlfriend told you to.”

“First of all Dan, she’s my _fiancée._ And my fiancée is the most stunning and the most brilliant woman who’s ever _existed_.” There’s a brief pause. “She’s also rich as fuck, okay, so back the fuck off.” 

“And you’re scared that her daddy won’t buy you the election the next time around.” 

“It’s treasonous to insult the President, Dan.”

“ _Ooooh._ ” Dan replies in his most obnoxiously bored voice that’s been specifically honed over the years to infuriate Jonah. In the background, Richard chirps “Actually, sir, the First Amendment protects the rights of all American citizens—“

“ _Richard—_ shut the fuck—“

“Better make sure that Justice Department of yours isn’t looking too closely into the trust fund of our future First Lady, Miss Shawnee Tanz.” Dan interjects, spinning a pen idly between his fingers.

Jonah scoffs. “Please, like the puny FBI scares Shawnee. Besides, she’s holding a fundraiser for them next week.” 

Dan sighs. He's definitely not making enough to put up with this fucking nonsense, and he makes a _shit-ton_. “Okay, I have actual work to do, and you’ve got to get back to—“

“Running the world like a fucking _baller_ —“

“—I was going to say vandalizing the Resolute Desk—“

“Wait, Dan, one more thing—”

“…what?”

There’s a meditative pause on the other end of the line. Then: “How’s Amy?”

“Goodbye, Jonad.”

“It’s _Mr. Presi—“_ The dial-tone cuts him off. 

There’s a pause while Dan takes a breath and Pierce just stares at the ceiling, looking torn between awe and discomfort. 

“…you were saying, Senator?”

*

So yeah, Jonah isn’t going to sign the health-care bill anytime soon, barring some kind of convenient military coup. The bill contains some very specific rules about prison inmate health care which were going to cost the Tanz family a shit-ton of money. And with Shawnee Tanz swanning around the West Wing and keeping the _President of the United States_ under her spell with vampiric blow jobs or whatever the fuck, Jonah wouldn’t even care that vetoing the bill would send his own party into open rebellion against him. He didn’t have to give a shit; he had the private prison lobby.

So. that’s where they stood: about to get royally fucked over by Jonah, because some things never fucking change.

Dan keeps Pierce in his office long enough to reassure him he can vote for the bill without jeopardizing his re-election before sending him on his way, and then Ben loops him on a conference call with Hallowes, and enough of the day flies by before he realizes he hasn’t heard from Amy. Who said she was going to call. 

This is weird, but not exactly worrisome. She and Liz had a big strategy session planned with the members of the VA committee, and then she had that appointment with her dad. And yet…normally they’ve been in some kind of contact by the afternoon, either work-related or kid-related, or even if it’s just Dan texting Amy their code for sex and Amy texting him back to keep it in his fucking pants until they get home. 

But Amy doesn’t call during lunch. She doesn’t call during lunch and she leaves all his texts unanswered.

He’s about to run out the door for another meeting when her name finally lights up his phone. 

“Ames, fucking _finally_ , listen, before I forget, I need you to bump up Liz’s meeting with Pierce—

“Dan.” 

“Seriously, he needs some hard-core maternal handholding, one of you just run down to his offi—“

“Dan.” Now he hears it—something flat and cold in her voice, like she’s trying to keep something down. 

“What?”

There’s a pause on the end of the line—an ominous, throbbing pause that swells and billows into Dan’s ear, and immediately he thinks of Cassidy, vivid nightmare scenes flashing through his mind in the span of a second (for that’s the unthinkable now, something happening to her, the fucking _idea_ of it fills his brain with static).

“Amy, _what?”_ Sudden panic turns his voice rough and sharp. 

“My dad...died.”

“…what?” Dan repeats again for the third time, dumbly. Cassidy flashes into his mind’s eye again. Chattering happily about butterflies in the kitchen. Making faces at him in the rearview mirror. Singing to herself in the backseat of the car. Something thumps in his chest.

“He died.”

“…Holy shit, Amy. _Shit_. What happened?”

“He went into cardiac arrest at the house—Mom called 911, they took him right away, but he—but he—” She doesn’t sound like she’s crying; she sounds like she’s about to throw up. 

“Jesus. Ames, I’m so…sorry.” The minute the words leave his mouth he’s struck by their absolutely fucking inadequacy. Holy shit. This was so not planned. 

There’s a shaky intake of breath, like she’s going to say something, but then—nothing happens. There’s just this echoing, wavering silence at the other end of the line that freaks him out more than anything she could actually say. 

“Where are you? Where’s your mom?”

“We’re at the hospital, they put us in a room—”

“Uh, okay, do you want me to—“

“We’re at GW—God, Sophie is fucking hysterical.”

“Are you—“ Dan asks, then stops. Dimly, he wishes he’d had the foresight to pick an office building where all the walls aren’t made of glass.

“Just come.” Amy hisses, and she’s gone. 

Dan puts his phone down and looks vaguely around his messy office, which suddenly doesn’t seem to belong to him at all. A sweater of Amy’s is hanging off the back of the armchair in the corner. On his desk, there’s a picture of Cassidy at her preschool graduation last June (a picture he strategically placed there with the express purpose of making himself look more appealing). Amy’s mom and dad had attended, brought Cassidy flowers and a present, like it was an actual graduation and not some pointless ceremony designed to celebrate that a bunch of five year olds could now identify colors. Cassie sat on Amy’s dad’s lap all through lunch afterward, and the Brookheimers had taken her home for the evening because Dan and Amy had some last-minute party fundraiser to work. 

“Hey,” Ben pokes his head in the door, “we gotta go, we have that meeting with—oh shit, what’s wrong?” He sees Dan’s face. “It’s not the kid, is it?”

“…Amy’s dad died.” Dan says, and the words feel strange, heavy in his mouth.

“Oh damn.” says Ben, and he looks genuinely sorry. “That’s terrible.”

“Yeah, it was really…I think it was sudden.”

“Ah, that’s rough. Didn’t he have some health problems?”

“I, uh…” And suddenly he doesn’t know what to say. _Yes_ , technically, is the answer, but it’s not like he’s paying rapt attention whenever Amy talks about her dad.

There was that stroke, or whatever it was, years ago, when they were in the veep’s office. The heart attack right after Montez’s first inauguration, after Nevada and Sophie—he and Amy were barely speaking to each other then, so he even hadn’t heard about it until a year later, after she had dumped Buddy-the-tumbleweed and returned to Selina in New York (it’s fucking _weird_ to think about that time now, Jesus, it feels like a different life). 

And then there had been the second heart attack, or something else heart-related, last year, during the last election, but he thought it hadn’t been serious—Amy had gone back to Maryland for a day, and that had been all. If he strains his memory, he thinks he remembers all the women talking about Mr. Brookheimer’s health at Christmas, some new diet or whatever, but he could have sworn everything was mostly fine. As fine it could be for a seventy year old who had two heart attacks in the past seven years. 

“Uh, I guess so, he’s been sick before, but I didn’t think there was anything…recent going on…” Heavily, he sits back in his chair. Ben lingers in the doorway, watching him closely.

He’s thinking about the bill, of course— _fuck,_ the bill. The vote’s already been scheduled, it’s in two and a half weeks, and now Amy’s going to have to deal with her batshit family on top of orchestrating a career-making, legacy-defining political triumph in Congress. And trying to get their mentally deluded President to sign off on it.

And…it’s her _father._  

“Fuck.” Dan mutters emphatically, rubbing a hand over his face, “Amy _loves_ her dad.”

“Well, most people do.” Ben says dryly. “Not you _,_ obviously.” 

“I guess…I guess have to go?” At the very last second he turns it into a question, as if maybe there's a possibility that nothing has changed and he can just go about the normal work day of manipulating politicians and feeling fucking great about it.

“Yeah, you do.” Ben agrees, and somehow, hearing him offer no objection makes it all the more real. So he obediently gathers up his stuff and tells Melissa that he’ll be out for the rest of the day for a family emergency (but obviously accessible at all times by phone and email). 

Ben follows him to the elevator.

“Hey, Danny-boy.” He points a finger at Dan heavily. “You have to, you know, be a human about this.” 

Dan flips him off on the way out. Six years into sharing a business, he doesn’t have to be on his best behavior around Ben anymore. 

*

Dan sort of expects to be greeted by a crowd of hysterical blondes the minute he enters the hospital reception, but of course there’s no one—Amy and her family are obviously hidden away on another floor, out of sight of the public. 

Hospitals give him the fucking creeps, that’s for sure. Even before his medical…interlude in London, he hated them. He hasn’t been here since Cassie was born, he thinks, even though the hospital is just blocks from the BKD office. Of course, he could have been in the fucking _wilderness_ watching Amy give birth for all he remembers the actual hospital itself, the entire delivery experience reduced to a blur of panic and rage and then panic again (it wasn’t like it was Amy’s best moment either, what with the screaming and the ripping and the bodily fluids everywhere.) 

The waiting room is almost empty at 1:47pm on a Friday, solid and suffocating. The two televisions are showing the local DC morning show, the one that’s always asking Amy to come on and talk about balancing motherhood and a political career (Dan’s obviously in favor of Amy going on. Amy is not). 

“What can I do for you?” the nurse at the reception desk finally asks him, after he’s stood there fidgeting and coughing like a fucking idiot for several minutes. 

“I’m looking for Mark Brookheimer’s family.” 

“Are you a relative?”

“I’m…married to his daughter.” Jesus, he almost said _son-in-law_ , but God knows neither he nor Mr. Brookheimer ever used the term. 

(Most of the time, Dan forgets he and Amy are married. He barely even thinks of it as being _together_. Being with Amy is just…being with Amy. Except now they have a kid and a house and he doesn’t fuck other people, but in exchange, he gets to fuck Amy whenever he wants.)

“Ah.” says the nurse, and her expression immediately softens. “Just a moment, Mr. Egan.” 

He never told her his name. Maybe she recognized Amy. Shit. He wonders who Amy’s told at work. Unlike Selina, Halliday runs a pretty discreet office. Which is what happens when Mike McClintock, the only press secretary in the world with permanent diarrhea of the mouth, isn’t your head of communications. 

“Mr. Brookheimer’s family is on the fourth floor, in a private room. Number 426. Mr. Egan, if you go upstairs, you’ll find them there.”

The elevator ride is much too short. Dan spends the entire thirty seconds quietly panicking that he’s about to see Amy in tears. He’s seen Amy cry, like, four times in all the years they’ve known each other, and one of them was labor. 

Room 426 is one of those private hospital rooms they use for larger families or important enough politicians and celebrities. The blinds are drawn, so he can’t see anything inside. Absurdly—he doesn’t know how the _fuck_ to go about any of this—he knocks gently on the door. 

It swings open immediately, but instead of one of the three female Brookheimers he was expecting, he’s face to face with some lunk he’s never seen before, red-faced and round-shouldered with a buzz-cut and a mustache, which makes him look like some sort of menacing version of the guy on Cassidy's Monopoly game, except he’s wearing a faded Philadelphia Eagles t-shirt instead of a tuxedo. 

“Who the fuck are you?” Dan sputters, forgetting for a second that Amy’s mother might be in the vicinity. 

The guy scowls at him. “Who the fuck are _you_?” 

“Ohhh,” and he can’t help but smirk. “I get it, you’re Sophie’s new chew toy. Get out of the way.” 

He elbows past the mystery-dude into the little waiting room. It takes him exactly one second to register that Amy is nowhere in sight. There’s just Sophie, slumped in an armchair, staring into space. 

“Oh. Dan.” she says flatly, looking more…subdued than he expected. Whatever Amy said on the phone, she’s definitely _not_ hysterical anymore. 

“Where’s Amy?” he demands without preamble. Her trench coat is tossed over the back of another armchair, the sleeve flopping over on top of her bag. So she _was_ here, she’s just…inconveniently disappeared. 

Sophie doesn’t answer. Monopoly-man comes stumping over. “Soph, who the hell is this guy?”

One of Sophie’s kids is sitting on the cheap couch. Dan on-purpose has never bothered to learn any of their names.

“Hey, Uncle Danny.” he says.

“ _Dan_.” Dan replies testily. “Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

“Suspended.” the kid answers, without raising his eyes from his phone. 

Monopoly-man is squinting at him. “Hey, have I seen you on tv?”

“Uh, I highly doubt it.” Dan replies, haughtily. Like this neanderthal is watching _Meet the Press_ before noon on a Sunday. “Sophie, tell me where the fuck Amy went.” 

“He was on _CBS This Morning_ for, like, two minutes.” Sophie says instead, and now she sounds more like her usual self, bored and spiteful. “Now he just does the political stuff on CNN.” 

“Oh yeah, you’re that Danny guy who was fucking Jane McCabe!” Monopoly-man no longer looks like he wants to punch Dan in the face. “Dude, _nice._ ” 

Dan immediately turns back to the door, so quickly his bag swings out behind him. “Okay, bye Sophie.” 

“Where the hell are you—“ 

He barges back into the hallway, accidentally-on-purpose slamming the door behind him, and doesn’t stop moving until he’s around the corner, trying to think of where Amy might have hidden herself in this giant fucking hospital. The chapel? He can’t see Amy going there. 

Standing like a fucking moron in the middle of the semi-crowded corridor, he glances around a bit desperately and catches the eye of one of the nurses. At first he think she’s trying, to, like, wink at him seductively—which, Amy’s dad just died, he doesn’t have time to deal with fans, okay?— but after staring at her for a few seconds, he realizes she’s actually raising her eyebrows up and down and blinking repeatedly at him. 

“What?!” he demands, crossly. 

The nurse rolls her eyes. “She’s in there, jackass,” she snaps loudly, and gestures toward one of the doors that line the corridor, one that is slightly ajar. 

Dan resists the urge to snap back at her: the last thing any of them need is some teenage patient live-tweeting a fight between him and this nurse (from the looks of her, she’d fucking win).

“Amy?”  

She’s standing by the window of the empty white room, arms folded at her waist. When she glances up, she looks about as lost as Dan’s ever seen her, like she’s standing in the wreckage of a fucking bomb, like someone’s hit her with a truck. Her eyes are fucking huge, burning blue at him.

For a minute they just stare at each other. 

“Dan,” she finally says, in a very strange voice. 

“Amy, shit, I’ve been _looking_ for you—“

In two strides he’s crossed the room to pull her against him, but she doesn’t respond, she just stands there limply, her wrists digging into his stomach. 

“Ames,” he begins again. “Fuck, I…I’m sorry.”

She makes a little grimace of complete disbelief, her eyes almost unfocused. “He was fine yesterday…we thought he was fine.”

“What happened?”

“I don’t know,” she whispers helplessly. “Sophie called me at work, she was crying, she said there was something wrong with Dad, he and Mom were on their way to the hospital in an ambulance…. “she shakes her head briefly, as though she’s trying to clear it, “…he was supposed go anyway, I was supposed to meet him…”

When she speaks again her voice is a lot less steady. 

“They said his heart…he said it was just finished, there was nothing anyone could have done…”

“Jesus,” Dan mutters emphatically, before he can stop himself. 

“My dad, Dan.” she hisses, her hand going to her mouth. “My fucking father. Shit.” Her voice breaks, and she ducks her head, her hair falling over face. 

“Hey,” he says, more quietly, gently brushing her hair back. “C’mere.” He wraps his arms around her shoulders, pulling her against him where she fits perfectly, the top of her head just under his chin. And this time she reacts; she digs her fingers into his suit and leans all her weight onto him, practically clinging. He runs a hand over her hair, which is a thing he does with Cassidy sometimes, but it feels weirdly right in the moment. 

“Where’s your mom? She wasn’t in the room.” 

“The chapel. She wanted to be alone.” Amy’s voice is muffled by his suit. 

“How is she?”

“I don’t know, she’s shocked, she’s numb…he was fine, we thought he was fine.” she repeats again, like she can’t get her head around it, actually frustrated with her own shock, and the reaction is so typically Amy that it perversely reassures him. He’s not really sure what to say—people die, sometimes they die unexpectedly, and obviously he avoids thinking about it at all costs—but even he can tell taking that approach isn’t the way to make her feel better. So he just holds her, making sure she feels him close, solid, while she takes deep, steadying breaths against him. 

They stand like that until an extremely disturbing possibility presents itself to Dan and he has to express it immediately. 

“Fuck…it wasn’t—it wasn’t in _this_ room, was it?”

Amy pushes back against his chest to glare at him. “What the hell, _no,_ you morbid dickhead, _God_. I just came in here to get away from Sophie.” 

“And her new boy-toy.” 

“Oh shit, he showed up? Jesus. They’ve been dating for like three fucking weeks.” But her annoyance seems to have centered her a bit: she pushes away from him, turning to go pace by the edge of the hospital bed, her brow furrowing. Dan perches on the bed itself, watching her.

After a few minutes, she says quietly, and he’s been waiting for it: “Dan, the vote.” 

Dan doesn’t say, “Fuck the vote.” He doesn’t say “Who fucking cares?” or “The vote is in two and a half weeks so you’ve got plenty of time.” He doesn’t even say “Jonah’s not signing the bill anyway,” which would be the most accurate response. 

Instead, he just asks “Did you tell Liz?” 

“Yeah, she says…”Amy clears her throat and clenches her fists at her sides. “She says I should take as much time as I need.” 

He nods. Of course, there’s no fucking way Amy’s going to actually accept that offer, but it was nice of Liz all the same. 

“I can’t believe—the timing of this—“ she mutters. “There’s still so much to do, I need to call—“ Dan’s already on his feet, reaching for her again, “Shit, I can’t even think right now, I can’t…” and she shoves her fingers into her hair, looking a bit manic. 

“You don’t have to think right now—Jesus, Amy, you’re shaking—“ 

But she bats his arm aside, wheeling away from him. “No, Dan, I have to go back to my mom, I can’t—“ 

“You can’t _what_? Your dad died fucking less than an hour ago—you can take five damn minutes—“

“She can’t rely on _Sophie_ for anything, you know that, and I need you to _let_ me go to her, if you touch me again right now I’ll just fucking _dissolve_ and I can’t do that right now, I fucking cannot—“

“ _Okay,_ ” He doesn’t do a very good job of keeping the agitation out of his voice. “Okay, fine, Amy. Go to your mom. I’ll be…I’ll go back and wait.” 

“Okay,” Amy repeats, looking maybe the least amount of okay he’s ever seen her. She lets out her breath again in a shaky exhale and smooths her hair. Then she straightens her skirt and turns methodically for the door, as though she’s going to a staff meeting instead of to comfort her grief-stricken mother. “Wait.” Dan interjects. “Do you want me to…”

She turns in the doorway, regarding him almost suspiciously. “What?” 

“I don’t know, what do you want me to do?! Call a car, order food, make sure this doesn’t leak, what?!”

For a second, Amy looks as at a loss as he feels. “Don’t leave.” she finally says quietly, and exits the room without looking back.   
  
*


	3. Chapter Two

Instead of returning to the private waiting room to deal with Sophie and her delinquent spawn and her probable felon of a boyfriend, Dan goes and hides by the vending machines in order to check his phone, only returning with a single coffee after he’s literally answered every single email in his email inbox, even the dumb ones from Pierce asking him if he thinks a particular type of suit cut will affect his polling numbers (the answer is _fucking duh_ ). Back in the waiting room, he sits in the corner and stares at Twitter and doesn't look at anyone. Sophie is, again, weirdly quiet, almost pensive, and if he thought about it for more than two seconds, he might find it unusual, but since it's Sophie, he doesn't think about it all and instead reads Jonah's moronic POTUS twitter feed, which is always a good way to waste time.   
  
Mrs. Brookheimer is red-eyed but calm, when she and Amy enter the little room, about half an hour later. She’s got the same wide-eyed, slightly shell-shocked expression that Amy has, but she’s mostly composed, hugging Dan tightly.

“Oh, Dan, thank you for being here. So good of you to leave work…I know how busy you and Amy both are.”

“Mom—“ Amy hisses, “Of course I’m here for _this_ —“

“Anything you need, Mrs. B.” Dan says loudly, talking over Amy, and it’s not often he ever feels _awkward,_ but seeing Amy’s mother two hours after the death of her husband sure as hell seems to be bringing it out in him. 

“Mark was so proud of you and Amy together.” she whispers. “And Cassidy. All three of you.”

He has no fucking clue what to say—it’s not even a fully true statement, obviously, since Mr. Brookheimer tried to pretend that he didn’t exist most of the time—so Dan just arranges his face into the fake-sympathetic-news-broadcaster expression he always used as “Danny Egan” and says “He was a real role model for me as a father.”

Mrs. Brookheimer’s eyes swim with tears. “That’s so kind.”

In turn, Amy gives him a _don’t-feed-my-mother-bullshit_ glare over Mrs. Brookheimer’s shoulder. 

There’s a lot of hullaboo about who’s going to get home how: Mrs. Brookheimer rode in the ambulance, Amy had Liz’s agents drive her, Sophie and her boyfriend drove in separate cars, Sophie’s kid can somehow drive even though he’s definitely not old enough. There’s a second where Dan hopes that Amy’ll just tell him to just go back to work—he’s even lingering by the door on purpose—but in the midst of all the discussion, she tugs him into the corner and asks in a low voice, “Is Cassie back from her field trip?”

Dan checks his watch. “Uh, at 3:35? Presumably?” Neither he and Amy have any idea when school actually ends and Cassidy’s fancy after-school program begins. They’re never able to get there before six in the evening and that’s on a _good_ day at work when they’re not running for something. 

“We have to go get her and and tell her what’s happened.” 

“ _Now?!_ ”

“Dan, she _loved_ my dad. I have to tell her today _._ Before she sees my mom.” 

Fuck, he hadn’t even _thought_ that they would have to deal with Cassie on top of Amy’s family. Shit. Now they’re going to have to try and explain the concept of death to a fucking five year old. True, Cassidy’s an _advanced_ five-year old—her grasp of electoral politics is much more complete than average congressman’s, for one thing—but the permanent disappearance of her grandfather, with whom she’s spent a significant amount of time seems like it’s going to be a lot more difficult and messy to explain. 

“…Are you sure she has to know?” 

Amy stares at him. “What the hell do you mean?”

“When I was seven, my favorite uncle died and nobody told me for three weeks, and I was, like, totally fine emotionally.” 

Incredibly, considering the circumstances, Amy actually snorts. “Yeah, totally fine emotionally _, that’s_ what you are, Dan Egan.” 

He rolls his eyes at her. “Okay, point taken, well, fine then, we can have Jessica pick her up whenever and bring her to your mom’s.” 

“No, _we_ have to do it.” Amy insists, looking the most like herself since Dan arrived at the hospital. “I want to see her now.” 

“…Okay,” he says, more tentatively. He’s not totally certain how Cassidy’s going to react to this news or to this rigid, grief-stricken version of her mom. But he doesn’t do a good job of hiding his hesitation, because Amy just glares at him and demands, loudly, “ _What_?” 

“Nothing,” he replies shortly. “Let’s go get her, fine.” 

“Well you don’t have to fucking _go_ with me, Dan—“

“How the fuck are you even going to get out there, your car’s twenty blocks away—“

“I’ll get a cab—“

“Yeah, a cab out to fucking Maryland won’t cost too much or anything like that, _I’m_ driving.” he retorts. Truth be told, he’s suddenly got an urge to see his daughter, to reassure himself that she’s perfectly fine and healthy and _fine,_ talking a mile a minute and demanding attention every damn second. Christ, he’s been in this fucking hospital for too long. It’s messing with his head.

*

Amy is silent for the entirety of the drive out to Cassidy’s school, curling up in the seat away from him and staring blankly out the window. It’s so quiet in the car that Dan can hear both their phones vibrating in their respective bags, but he doesn’t dare turn on the radio or speak or even touch her—it all seems so fucking inadequate.

He’s starting to wish she _were_ crying. This dry-eyed, hollowed-out version of Amy is something else entirely. He’s never seen her like this before, even when Selina had lost her last election. Then, she’d been more manically furious than anything else, which had been _fantastic_ for him because they’d just channeled it all into a lot of hot rage-sex…they’d dumped Cassidy at Amy’s parents and he got to keep her to himself in the bedroom for four entire days while she worked out all her frustration…it had been fucking glorious.

Dan starts to grin at the recollection before catching sight of his face in the side mirror of the car, and hastily coughs to cover it up. On the other side of the car, Amy doesn’t even react.

The Whitehaven Academy is in a leafy part of town not too far from the US Naval Observatory (an area of Washington they both know all too well). Dan selected the private prep school a year and a half ago, after an extremely rigorous research process that involved dragging an extremely over-it Amy back and forth across D.C. to open houses and multiple private appointments with the school directors of various exclusive independent schools.

In order to convince Amy why she should care more about the whole thing, he had pinned up a giant map of Washington on the wall in her office and traced all over it to show how all of the parents he had met were connected through various professional networks, and basically before Cassidy had even been accepted anywhere he had plotted out how they could ultimately use her inaugural preschool class to manipulate the entire city into doing their bidding.

Amy hadn’t been impressed.

“What in the everlasting _fuck_ are you—oh my god, this is the _most demonic_ thing I’ve ever seen you do, and _that_ is already an extremely high bar to reach for you. This belongs in the underground lair of the fucking Zodiac Killer.”

“I’m thinking about the _future_ here, Amy.”

“You are not going to have a fucking future if I have you committed because choosing a school for your daughter has finally made you go full-on American Psycho.”

“Don’t underestimate the political utility of playdates.”

“Oh _what_ , are you going to fucking _control_ who she becomes friends with?”

“It doesn’t matter, I can work with any one of them. Besides, they’re four year olds, they don’t give a shit who they play with.”

“Get this cursed abomination off of government property _right the fuck now_ before I have to perform a citizen’s arrest. _”_

(But she didn’t complain when Dan leveraged a parent connection into starting a wave of negative press stories about Montez’s new drug policy, or when they went to dinner with another set of parents in Cassidy’s class and accidentally-on-purpose discovered that a rival Senator was planning to defect to the other side on a major infrastructure bill.)

“Dan? The light’s turned green.” Amy’s voice—as quiet and toneless as he’s ever heard it—lures him back to the present. 

“Oh, shit, sorry.”

A few minutes later, he pulls up in front of the lower school, which is brick and bordered with big trees and as covered in ivy as the prestigious college campuses Whitehaven guarantees their students are accepted into. Much to his surprise, Amy gets out of the car with him once they’re parked. “Uh, you want to go in with me?” he asks her. There’s a decent chance they run into some other kindergarten mother who Amy can’t stand, and she can barely deal with that on a normal day. The stay-at-home contingent of Whitehaven mothers fucking _hate_ Amy because she never volunteers to bake things for class parties or bothers to attend their exclusive mommy-yoga retreats, and also because they’re all (understandably, of course) obsessed with him.

“Yes,” Amy says tightly, shaking out her hair. “I said I wanted to tell her now, and I meant it. I’m not waiting until we’re out at my mother’s house.” And before he can say or do anything else, she’s already striding for the doors, and he has to practically jog to catch up.

But sure enough, at the front entrance they bump into Samantha Nelson, a stay-at-home mother of one of Cassidy’s classmates, married to a corporate lobbyist at PKM (Dan knows because he had it memorized after the first week of school). Her son, paint-smeared and spiky-haired, is at her side. The contrast between the two women couldn’t be clearer: Samantha, clad head-to-toe in Lulu Lemon with a perfectly tousled blow-out, and Amy, buttoned-up and severely professional in her trench-coat and Dan’s favorite pencil skirt, still shorter than Samantha even in four-inch heels.

“Oh, Dan, Amy!” Samantha exclaims. “How nice to see the two of you _together_ , we hardly ever see you both in one place at the same time, what a _fun_ surprise. We were starting to wonder if everything was all right at home.”

Before Dan can jump in, Amy bares her teeth in an acid smile. “Yes, it’s fucking miraculous. If I were you, though, I would probably spend more time worrying about your son’s tendency to eat glue, or the fact that your fillers are collapsing, rather than wondering how much my husband and I are fucking. Have a _lovely_ evening.”

Dan laughs out loud as Amy stalks on into the school, he can’t help it, Samantha’s face is fucking priceless. Forget the networking, _this_ is his favorite thing about having a kid in private school, watching Amy blatantly insult everyone she encounters without giving a single fuck. Grabbing the swinging door in her wake, he smiles his most shit-eating grin right in Samantha’s face, and nods down at her brat. “Keep working on the glue thing, kid. Samantha, see you at the next fundraiser.”

Inside the front office, Amy’s barking at the school receptionist to summon their own child at once. 

“Before the end of the day, please,” she demands, practically snapping her fingers.

“Yes, of course, Ms. Brookheimer, we don’t normally expect you until later—“

“Save the parenting advice, you prune— _“_

When Dan catches up to them, he slides an arm around Amy’s waist, pulling her away from the front desk so she’s almost flush against him. 

“Hey.” he says, smirking down at her. It’s _endlessly_ fucking hot, Amy getting into bitchy cat-fights with the crazy stay-at-homes, nothing gets him worked up quite like watching her go toe-to-toe with some bored D.C. housewife. 

“What?” Amy says, looking at him with just a faint echo of her usual exasperation on her face.

“Nothing,” he says, innocently, because the receptionist is right there, but he runs his hand down over her ass anyway, 

“You caveman,” she replies disgustedly, reading his mind like she always does, but her lips are twitching, and for one second it’s like a regular Friday, and they’ve gotten here earlier than usual for a _nice_ reason, not because Amy’s dad died three hours ago and they have to figure out how to tell their five and a half year old kid.

After a moment, Cassidy appears in her usual whirl, dashing up the main hallway and blatantly ignoring the big “No Running” sign. “Mommy!” she cries, looking delighted. “You’re here with Daddy!”

“Hi, Cassie,” Amy says, smiling and holding out her arms as her daughter basically crashes into her knees. Immediately, her face transforms into that sunny, _tender_ expression that still knocks Dan out a bit every time he sees it. Sometimes the realization hits him all over again, that Amy’s a mother, that she _chose_ to become a mother to a real honest-to-god miniature human when he accidentally knocked her up. She could have chosen something else (at the very beginning, he had thought she was insane not to). But she didn’t, and now there’s this kid with half of his DNA who immediately cries for her mother if she has a nightmare and that mother is _Amy._ It’s fucking mysterious. 

“Look what I got at the museum!” Cassidy thrusts out a wrist, where there’s a large sparkly fake butterfly tattoo spackled over her skin. Obediently, Dan and Amy oooh and ahhhh over it as they herd her back to the parking lot. Cassie barely notices where they’re going, wrapped up in her usual end-of-the-day rundown.

“We saw this huge dinosaur skeleton, and a butterfly landed _right on my nose,_ it was _soo_ cool, but then we had to go look at a bunch of other gross bugs and I didn’t want to go into the room with the spiders but then I held Ms. Browning’s hand and it was all right. And then we got to do an _es-periment—“_

 _“_ Experiment,” Dan corrects automatically.

“—experiment, where we gave different leaves to some caterpillars—”

“Here, take this off, Cassie,” Amy says absently, removing her backpack and thrusting it at Dan. He grimaces at the feel of the corduroy—someone needs to explain to him how the fuck kids get all their things so sticky and tacky.

By now they’ve reached the car, and Cassidy suddenly pauses in her tirade, looking up at her parents suspiciously and digging in her heels against Amy’s lead.

“Wait…why are you early? Why is Daddy here?”

Shit. In order to avoid looking at either one of them, Dan takes the opportunity dump Cassidy’s backpack in the trunk of the car. He hears Amy sigh, and say wearily, “I need to tell you something sad, Cassie. Come over here with me for a bit.”

Cassidy’s brow furrows. “Sad?”

“Yeah. Sit down, baby.” She leads Cassidy over near the deserted playground, where Cassidy hops up on a bench, ankles swinging. Amy squats down, so they’re at eye-level, and takes Cassidy’s hands in her own. Dan trails over to them, leaning against the fence. Amy’s clearly set on doing this now, herself, and it’s not like he wants to be responsible for telling Cassie what’s happened (already all the emotions in the air are starting to make him antsy), but he also feels like there needs to be an adult present who’s a bit more detached from the situation.

For a moment, Amy just looks at her daughter, then takes a breath as though steeling herself. “Your grandfather died this afternoon.” 

The silence on the playground suddenly seems to be roaring around them. Cassidy gazes back at her mother questioningly, with identical wide, light eyes, except hers are fringed with long, black lashes. “…He died?”

“Yeah. You know how he was sick sometimes? Today, the…the sickness was too much for him. He died.”

“Oh.” Cassidy blinks. She’s…quieter than Dan expected. He was frankly expecting hysterical tears and a five-alarm meltdown, like the time they had accidentally left one of her stuffed animal on Liz’s plane. She looks down at her shoes, peeks back up at Amy. “Is he in heaven now?”

Amy’s eyes flicker up to meet Dan’s in an expression of faint annoyance. It’s _his_ mother who insists on dragging Cassidy to mass whenever she’s in town. Dan shrugs his shoulders at her irritably.

“He’s in a…different place now, yes.” Amy says, slowly. Dan can see the reality of what’s happened closing in on her again, her body taut with tension and on her face this awful, fragile expression, like looking at her kid is the only thing keeping her together.

“…Can I see him?”

Amy swallows hard at that question. Dan has the very strong impulse to reach out and touch her, but he knows that won’t help her now, not when she’s still in the middle of this fucking surreal conversation. 

“No, baby, you can’t see him anymore. But you have your memories of all the fun things you did together. And he loved you so much, Cassie.”

“…Mommy, are you sad?” Cassidy whispers after a moment, looking tentative.

And suddenly Amy ducks her head and lets out this desperate, hysterical half-laugh half-sob that echoes all over the parking lot, like she just can’t keep it in anymore. It’s fucking _alarming_. Dan jolts away from the fence and Cassidy’s eyes, if possible, get even bigger and she shrinks back against the bench, glances instinctively and worriedly at Dan.

“Daddy—!“

“It’s okay—“

Amy lifts her head after what seems like a fucking interminable twenty seconds. Her eyes are extremely bright, but she’s not crying, not yet. She takes another breath and tries to smile, although it’s pretty grotesque. Her voice shakes a little when she says, “Yeah, baby, I am sad. It’s okay, though. Come here.”

She pulls her daughter close and holds her for a few minutes. Cassidy buries her face in Amy’s chest and clings on. “Mommy,” she whispers again, as if to reassure herself that if Amy’s still here, nothing too terrible can have happened.

Dan looms over the pair of them, feeling perfectly fucking useless. Jesus fuck, this is  _awful._

“We’re going to Grandma’s now,” Amy says quietly, brushing Cassidy’s hair back from her face. “But you may not see her for a little while. She’s also really sad.”

“Is that why Daddy’s here? And not at work?”

Impulsively, Dan sweeps Cassie up in his arms as they start to walk back to the car. “Yeah, kiddo, I wanted to be here for you and your mom.”

Cassidy squints at him, blue eyes suspicious. “Are you sad too?”

“Uh…sure, yeah, I can be sad, I’m sad.”

An inscrutable look flits over Amy’s face for a second, but it’s gone before Dan can ask her what she’s thinking.

*

The drive into Maryland is just as quiet as the trip to the school. Cassidy's in the backseat, with her “thinking” face on, not saying anything, and the silence is louder than ever. Amy keeps glancing at her surreptitiously in the rearview mirror, as though she might explode with emotions without any warning.

At some point, Dan can’t take the silence anymore and turns on the radio, and the monotonous nonsense blaring seems to relax everyone visibly (at least in Cassidy’s case—Dan’s fairly positive they produced the only kid in the history of the world who finds the sound of shouting adults soothing). Eventually, though, they make it to the Brookheimer neighborhood, at which point Amy immediately stiffens in her seat. Surrounding them are the familiar sedate rows of large houses, streets lined with maple trees and perfectly trimmed gardens and neatly designed parks, the neighborhood looking like exactly what it is: a zombie suburban dystopian nightmare that fucked up Amy so badly, and that she soundly rejected once and for all by choosing to have Dan’s baby. 

The Brookheimer house feels _weird_ when they finally walk inside. Dan can feel Amy stiffen the second she opens the front door. “Fuck,” she hisses, stopping so suddenly that Dan bumps into her from her behind. Cassidy, of course, continues straight through the front hallway, not even looking behind her.

“Hey,” he says, quietly, reaching for her waist to steady her. “It’s okay.”

“Okay,” she whispers frantically, “I know, it’s fine. It’s fine.”

But she doesn’t move.

“…Ames,” he finally ventures, “you don’t have to be here—“

 _That_ gets her to move, but not for the reasons he wanted. “Yes, I do,” she insists fiercely, and then marches in after Cassidy.

“Jesus, that took you long enough.” Sophie snaps as they all walk into the kitchen. She’s hunched over the kitchen island, and looks pretty wrecked—she’s obviously been crying again, her eyes swollen and her make-up completely gone.

“Sophie, _our_ kid actually goes to school.” Dan retorts, lazily slinging his bag aside.

“Uh, _hello,_ “ she sniffs dramatically, gesturing to the living room where all three of her kids are now sprawled around, staring at screens. Monopoly-man is nowhere in sight, which is good (Dan doesn’t want his own kid within fifty feet of that guy without a complete background check by the fucking FBI.) None of Sophie’s kids even glance up at them, although the oldest girl does say, “Hi, Aunt Amy.”

“Hi, Kara.” Amy says, also not looking at her. “Sophie, where’s Mom?”

“Upstairs.”

“Alone? Have you checked on her?”

“Amy, other people can do things without your supervision.”

“Can you, though?” Amy snaps, sounding pretty wrecked herself. “Have you called anyone yet? Have you called _anyone_ in Dad’s family?”

“No, _god_ , do I look like I can call people right now—I’m not a robot like _you—“_

Amy’s face twists, but her phone starts ringing. Completely on impulse, she fishes it out of her coat pocket, but she glances at the screen first and her face actually pales.

“Oh shit,” Dan says, catching on. “Is it—“

“Fucking _of course—_ “

“Give it to me—“

“What the fuck are you guys talking about?” Sophie demands.

Amy presses her eyes shut, looking almost physically drawn with rage. “Dan, I can’t—you deal with him, I don’t have time to deal with that mutant bacterial strain—“ She slams the phone down on the kitchen island and brushes past him, presumably heading for the second floor.

“Wait, Amy, are you going to check on Mom without me?!” Sophie stomps after her, and Dan can hear them hissing at each other all the way up the stairs. He answers Amy’s ringing phone with a terse “Fuck off, Jonah,” before hanging up and stashing it in her bag. There’s a rush of footsteps above him—Amy and Sophie running to their mother—and then silence falls over the house, and that _weirdness_ settles over everything again like a fine film of dust.

Jesus. He would _so_ _much_ rather be at work right now. 

Cassidy’s settled into her grandfather’s armchair, staring at the tv. All of Sophie’s kids are silent. There…doesn’t seem to be anything for Dan to do, and yet…he obviously _can’t_ leave. This is what he has to do now, right? Fucking family shit, like voluntarily hanging out in Maryland because Amy’s dad has died, when he could be doing _literally_ anything else.

Aimlessly, he wanders back into the front hallway and to the other side of the house, which is rarely used. There’s a pristine dining room and a sitting room that both give off a sense of long disuse. In the empty sitting room, staring in vague distaste at a shelf of ornate shepherdess figurines, he pulls out his own phone and calls Amy’s boss.

“Dan,” Senator Halliday—Liz—addresses him crisply, in her usual no-nonsense tone. “How’s Amy?”

“Uh…still in shock, I think,” he answers, honestly. “We’re at her parents’—her mother’s—in Maryland.”

“Please pass on my sympathies to her family. This must be an unimaginably difficult time for all of them.” 

“Of course, ma’am.”

“If you need anything from me, don’t hesitate. There’s no point telling Amy this, of course, because she has a sense of moral propriety, so I’m telling _you,_ Dan, because you conspicuously lack one.”

“It’s why you hired me, Senator.” Dan replies, smirking to himself. Liz _barely_ tolerates him. But unlike Selina, she doesn’t let her emotional foibles compromise her ability to identify quality advice.

“Yes,” She sounds pained. “You can assuage my conscience by turning my bill into law in such a way so that fucking infant in the White House can’t do anything about it, no matter how many tantrums he throws on Twitter.” 

“Why else would I be calling?”

They discuss the strategy for the health-care vote for the next few minutes—new plan is to try and push for a two-thirds majority to override Jonah’s likely veto, although Dan doesn’t have much hope—before Liz has to run out for a quorum call.

“Dan?”

“Yes?”

“If Amy’s at work on Monday, I am absolutely going to fire you.”

”Amy can make her own decisions, ma’am.” Dan replies, stiffly. One fucking annoying thing about being in a relationship—which both he and Amy are, frankly, still in denial about eighty percent of the time—is that now people assume they wield some sort fucking control over each other. Just because they fuck one another exclusively now, and, okay, live together and share a kid and a house, doesn’t mean he’s got any damn influence over what Amy does. Whether Amy should go into work two days after the death of her father isn’t his fucking decision to make.

Liz just hangs up on him in response, so all in all…a fairly civil conversation between them without Amy as the mediator.

Back in the living room, none of the kids have moved. Dan watches Cassidy watching the tv for a bit before heading upstairs. He’s got no idea how much any of this is going to sink in for her, and he’s not exactly interested in figuring out the answer.

The second floor landing of the house is dominated by framed photos of various Brookheimers, including the same photo of Cassidy at her preschool graduation that Dan’s got on his desk, except this one is much bigger, hung over a table with a vase of flowers beneath it like some kind of fucking shrine. To the right, down the hallway, is the door to Amy’s bedroom, a bathroom, and the guest bedroom at the front of the house that’s basically been converted to the “grandkids” room. To the left is Sophie’s bedroom, and around the corner from that, the master bedroom suite. Dan has studiously avoided that part of the house since his visits to the Brookheimer residence became more regular.

And yet, here he is, knocking on the master bedroom door. “Uh, Amy, Liz would like me to convey to your mother and sister her deepest condolences—“

Amy opens the door so suddenly he takes a step backward.

“Shit, you scared—"

“Listen,” she says flatly, without preamble. “Go take the kids somewhere.”

“What?”

“Take the kids, go do something somewhere, a bookstore, the playground, a rock quarry, I don’t fucking care, just get them out of the house, so we can—so we can have privacy.”

“Yeah, okay, I can take Cass and—“

“No, all of them—Sophie’s kids too.”

He looks at her in horror. “What? Are you shitting me?” Dan has worked _very_ hard to spend as limited time as possible with the Sophie branch of the Brookheimer family. That’s not about to change just because Amy’s dad is dead.

“Just take them out, fucking entertain them, it’s not like it’s hard.”

“It’s not _hard_?! Amy—“

“You wanted to know what you can do, _that’s_ what you can do.” And she closes the door in his face, leaving Dan to gape furiously at solid wood.

“Fuck.” he mutters, and storms back down the stairs.

“Hey, junior Brookheimers.” he announces loudly, poking his head into the living room. “Get up, we’re going.”

“Wha…?” says the middle one, abstractedly.

“You.” Dan points to the oldest. “Find the nearest mall.”

She looks at him disdainfully over the top of her phone. “Nobody goes to the mall, Uncle Danny.”

He grits his teeth. “Do they go to the movies?”

“No, we stream everything. How fucking old are you?”

“Then this will be a a new experience for everyone. Let’s go.”

Nobody budges, not even his own kid.

“Uh, you can see an R-rated movie.” he offers.

“Mom already lets us see R-rated movies.” replies Sophie’s youngest, who can’t be more than nine or ten.

“I’ll go to the movies with you, Daddy, if you want to go to the movies.” Cassidy offers pityingly, the way you’d talk to a kid who had no one to sit next to at lunch. Dan can’t lie, it’s a low moment for him.

“Cassie, go out to the car,” he orders, and clearly recognizing his tone, she scoots past him for the front door. Surprisingly, Sophie’s youngest gets up and follows her. Dan checks that no one is on the stairs before stalking over to the older teenagers and snatching the phone out of the boy’s hands. It’s also sticky—Dan doesn’t even _want_ to know with what.

“Hey!” the kid squeals, his voice cracking.

“Listen up, you delinquent illegitimate adolescent dickholes,” he says threateningly, in his most dangerous _someone’s-fucked-up-at-work_ voice. “Your grandfather just died, so why don’t you get the fuck off the couch and give your grandmother and your mother and Amy two _fucking_ seconds to themselves. Got it? You have exactly sixty fucking seconds to move your asses.” He tosses the sticky phone back to its owner—it lands on his chest with a satisfying thud—and makes a big show of wiping his hand on his coat.

The oldest—Kayla?—just rolls her eyes. “You’re a lot more chill on TV, Uncle Danny.”

“It’s _Dan._ Now get in the damn car.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the slightly longer gap in posting-back at school, trying to stay on top of writing, and had to rewrite an upcoming chapter. All comments and kudos are so deeply appreciated and make the writing worthwhile. You guys rock :-)


	4. Chapter Three

 

* * *

Dan manages to refrain from insisting that Sophie’s kids sit on newspaper or plastic bags or something in his car (it’s a nice car, okay?). Kara claims shotgun, which sets off a loud argument between her and her two siblings that lasts until they’re out in the freeway, and Dan has to shut it down so he can hear the GPS system.

Cassidy, trapped in the backseat—she’s still too small to ride in the front of the car, or Dan would have obviously kept her up there with him—keeps sending him extremely skeptical glances in the rearview mirror, like she also knows how bad of an idea this whole outing is. 

As it turns out, the nearest movie theater is at a mall, one of those shopping complexes desperately trying to stay relevant by reinventing itself as a charming small-town center, with fake “Tuscan-style” architecture and little landscapped pathways and outdoor sitting areas crisscrossing between the depressing concrete-block buildings. After exactly twelve and a half minutes in the car, Dan’s already hit his limit for handling Sophie’s offspring in close quarters—no fucking way he’s voluntarily entering a darkened theater with all three of them in tow at once. He ends up sending the oldest two off with fifty bucks each—suddenly malls aren’t so lame after all, _Tyler_ —and vague instructions to return in an hour or so. Both of them disappear the minute the cash touches their hands. 

There’s a decent chance he returns to the house tonight minus a kid or two, but he doesn’t really give a fuck. 

With the oldest two successfully dispatched, Dan takes Cassidy and Sophie’s youngest (Alyssa) off to find some ice cream, in the hope that sugar will distract them from any feelings they might risk experiencing while he’s solely in charge of supervising them. So far, neither of them seem to be in any danger of an emotional meltdown—in fact, they actually seem to be friends, walking close together and giggling, Cassie’s dark head tilted up toward Alyssa’s blonde one. This is disconcerting, but then again, considering how liberally Amy and Dan have relied on her parents for babysitting, Cassidy’s definitely seen a lot more of her cousins than either one of her parents have in the past five years.

He locates an ice cream shop, lets them order whatever they want, buys a scoop of chocolate for himself because what the hell, and sets up them on a bench outside near a large outdoor fountain that looks like it came from the clearance warehouse of a Pottery Barn.

While the girls are eating, he checks his phone again. Nobody’s moved on the bill, Kent’s sent him the daily update, and he’s got a bunch of text messages from people in Amy’s office expressing their condolences, which is kind of weird, like he’s actually a member of the Brookheimer family, or something, or like he and Mr. Brookheimer were close.

They were never close. Things got _better_ , yeah, a little warmer…at least, they were on speaking terms, but it wasn’t exactly like they had a shit ton in common. And Mr. Brookheimer never really stopped insinuating that Dan was running some sort of relationship long-con and could disappear at any moment, leaving his daughter and granddaughter in the lurch. (Which, if he _were_ doing that, there’s no fucking way he would have lasted this long. Sleep-training alone was enough to make him regret that he and Amy hadn’t used a condom the night he knocked her up, no matter how fucking cute Cassie was when she wasn’t shrieking for attention at all hours of the damn night).

By the time he and Amy got around to getting married, Mr. Brookheimer wasn’t visibly horrified, and that, Dan figured, was about as good as things were ever going to get. 

They occasionally talked politics—Mr. Brookheimer followed the news, unlike Sophie and Amy’s mom— but it was never like he and Amy had a bunch of free time to sit around shooting the shit with her parents. Her relationship with her whole family was so twisted anyway, he frankly considered it his job to not give a flying fuck about what they were thinking. (not that he did anyway). He put in _exactly_ enough effort to make sure they would babysit whenever he and Amy needed it, and God knows it wasn’t much, since Cassie was their favorite grandchild anyway (obviously, since she was the only one not headed to juvenile detention). 

Most days, for Amy, that was enough. Most days. 

“Daddy,” Cassidy’s poking him in the arm. “You’re dripping ice cream on your pants,”

“What—? Oh, shit.” There are drops of chocolate scattered over his right knee. Fuck, he’ll have to get this to the dry-cleaner’s stat. He frantically dots at the stains with a napkin, and then turns his attention to Cassie, who’s got caramel smeared all over one cheek.

“C’mere, Cass, you’re a mess too.”

She wriggles rebelliously as he wipes off her face, whining that he’s messing up her hair and eventually snatching the napkin away from him and insisting on doing it herself. Dan lets her go and wishes Amy were here, because she never goes anywhere without enough baby wipes in her bag to wipe down an entire fucking army battalion of kindergarteners. 

But thinking about Amy, now, all he can picture is that scene on the playground, where she had temporarily folded in on herself with that awful, wracking cry. It’s been echoing at the back of his head ever since. He can’t get it out of his mind, that terrible expression on her face, all of her usual intensity and energy stripped away, leaving nothing except that…fragility. And Cassie’s face when she saw Amy like that, that wide-eyed dismay and confusion. The whole thing was just extremely unsettling, and he’d rather not think about it all. He can’t sit around dwelling over what’s happened like some fucking morbid…teenager, that’s not what anybody needs.

When Cassie’s settled back into her seat and picks up her ice cream again, he reaches out and steals some with his own spoon. She shrieks and glares at him so fiercely, it’s perversely reassuring—he’s pretty confident the only thing on her mind right now is sugar. 

“Mean!” she hisses. “I’m telling Mommy later.” And then her blue eyes light up with a very recognizable gleam and…she starts negotiating. “Since you stole some, this means I can have dessert later.”

“Sorry, kiddo, this is special afternoon dessert that only happens once a day on very rare occasions.” Like deaths in the family, or passing laws, or winning elections.  

Cassie thinks that over—he recognizes her expression, she’s trying to decide if it’s worth it to make a fuss—but eventually she just goes back to her ice cream and asks, “Are we staying at Grandma and Grandpa’s tonight?”

Internally, he winces at her use of “Grandpa” and distracts himself by making sure he’s gotten rid of the last of the chocolate on his pants. “Maybe. I’m not sure, though. It probably depends on what your grandmother wants.”

It suddenly occurs to him that Alyssa is definitely no longer seated on the bench with them, but seconds later he spots her over by the fountain bothering some scrappy-looking pigeons. Gross, they’re all going to have ride together in the car on the way back to the house. Is bird flu still a thing? Which reminds him—doesn’t Cassie have a doctor appointment or something coming up soon? Shit, he hopes it’s not too close to the vote, otherwise he and Amy will have to argue about who has to take time off work in order to take her to the appointment.

Or they would _normally_ argue about who had to take her. Somehow, with Amy’s dad dying, he suspects that he’s going to have to handle more kid-related tasks in the next few weeks. 

He’s busy checking the calendar on his phone when Alyssa calls out, “You’re back!” 

“Yo, Uncle Danny.” Kara and Tyler are walking toward them up the pathway, swinging multiple shopping bags from their hands. Alyssa skips back over from the fountain, presumably to protect her ice cream from her brother. 

“Hey, you're actually still here.” Dan says, straightening up in surprise. "I’d have thought you’d have headed for the border by now.”

“Ha ha ha,” Kara replies sarcastically, slumping down next to Cassie on the bench.  “I figure my mom doesn’t need to have a freaking heart attack the same day Grandpa dies.” She rummages through one of her bags, and then hands Cassidy a packet of Disney Princess stickers and Alyssa a cheap-looking bracelet. “Here, babies.” she says, carelessly.

Cassidy accepts the present with a completely unimpressed look on her face, as though she’s just been handed a bag of dirt, and looks at him sideways. Amy’s pretty much banned all Disney princess paraphernalia in their house. 

“Can I have some more money?” Tyler asks. Dan ignores him.

“Can we go home?” Alyssa echoes. “I want Mom.” 

“We can’t go home yet,” Dan mutters into his phone. “Believe me, if we could go home, we would.” He’s already spent more time alone with Sophie’s kids in a single afternoon than he’d ever planned to for the rest of his life, and the knowledge is fucking depressing. (Although…it’s also not like he’s super eager to rush back to the Brookheimer residence and deal with all the emotions percolating there, like some giant emotional coffee maker of sadness.) 

“Mom’s busy with Grandma. You know. Grieving.” Kara informs her sister bossily, back on her phone again. 

“What does grieving mean?” 

“Being sad, duh.”

“Are you sad?” Dan asks, before he can stop himself. 

She glares at him. “Of course I’m sad.” she snaps, snottily. “But he was old and sick and this is what happens when you get old and sick. You die.”

“Nice,” he comments wryly. “Save that for the funeral.” 

“I’m sad too.” Alyssa announces. “I loved Grandpa. He made good pancakes.” 

“We read the comics in the newspaper.” Cassidy offers, and Dan looks down at her, startled. She’s not even looking at him, instead regarding the sticker book with some interest now. 

“You read the newspaper with him?” he repeats, unable to hide his surprise. 

“For reading practice for school. And he taught me to play checkers.” She peels off a sticker and sticks it experimentally on the stone bench, like she’s bored with the conversation. 

Shit. It never really occurred to Dan that all the times he and Amy dropped off Cassidy at her grandparents she was actually _doing_ stuff there, without them, without him. Like learning how to read, Jesus, he’d always assumed she was so interested in reading because _he_ read to her, he’s been reading speech excerpts to Cassidy since before she was born, for fuck’s sake. 

“Well, I’m the _most_ sad.” Kara announces loudly. “I knew him the longest. I’ve already told all my friends. I’m going to be the center of attention on Monday. Grandpa was, like, my best friend.” 

Dan rolls his eyes, not even bothering to hide his complete disgust. “Oh really?” 

“Uncle Danny, _hi,_ you’re new here, Tyler and I totally lived in that house when we were little.”

“Me too!” Cassidy points out mutinously “I’m there a lot too!”

“Only because your parents need the free babysitting,” Kara informs her, acidically sweet, as though Dan’s not sitting two feet away. Cassie’s probably too young to pick up on the fake-ass tone she’s using, but it’s still a bitchy comment directed solely at his daughter, and Dan seizes gratefully on the protective displeasure that goes thudding through him. 

“As opposed to your mom,” he retorts flatly, reaching out and putting a hand on Cassidy’s back, “who was _actually_ still living at home when you were born. And fucking watch how you talk to my kid.”

Kara just tosses her hair back, the insult and his threatening tone rolling off her back. “Whatever, I knew him the longest, so this is a bigger deal for me. What the hell do you even care?”

“Jesus,” Dan mutters to the sky. He can’t fucking believe he’s legally related to these people. 

“Anyway,” she continues idly, “Mom totally knew this was coming. She told me.” 

Something about this rings a dim kind of alarm at the back of Dan’s head.

“Wait, what?”

Kara looks at him like he’s an idiot. “Mom told me Grandpa’s health wasn’t great and something might happen soon.”

“Yeah, I remember that.” Tyler speaks again without raising his eyes from his phone. He could be looking at porn, for all Dan knows (or cares).

“Me too.” Alyssa contributes extremely unhelpfully, and Cassidy turns to look at him reproachfully. 

“Uh, _when_ was this?” Dan’s fucking positive Amy never mentioned some kind of imminent health crisis. As little as he pays attention when she talks about her family, he’s certain he would have remembered that, she would have had _some_ kind of noticeable reaction. He flashes back to the bleak scene in the hospital earlier that day: Amy, devastated and disbelieving, her stubborn insistence on the fact her father had been fine, and Sophie, dramatic and miserable, but also strangely…resigned. 

“Weeks ago,” Kara shrugs. “I don’t know.”

“Shit,” Dan mutters to himself. “Shit, Amy never said anything.” If her family had known something about her father’s health, if they had known that some kind of crisis was imminent, and they had neglected to tell her, or rather—knowing Sophie—someone hadn’t told her on purpose…Amy was going to freak the _fuck_ out. The news might actually send her over the edge. And they’ve got the most important vote of their _careers_ coming up in a few weeks. 

“Well, what would she know about it?” Kara sneers. Her face is twisted into the nastiest expression he’s seen all afternoon. “You and Aunt Amy are never around.” 

Christ, he is going to fucking shoot himself if Cassidy turns into _this_ when she becomes a teenager.

“ _Okay._ ” he announces abruptly, standing up so suddenly that Cassie almost slips off the bench. Suddenly, he’s over the whole fucking conversation. Done with thinking about the Brookheimers and their fucked up family dynamics, done with trying to manage Sophie’s toxic offspring, done with being away from Amy. “We’re done. Ice cream’s over. We’re going.”

“Where are we going?” Alyssa whines. “I want to go home.” 

Tyler finally looks up from his phone. “I never got any ice cream.”

“Tough. I’ll let you pick pizza toppings.”

“I don’t do dairy.” Kara informs him haughtily. “So we can’t have cheese on our pizza.” 

Cassidy wrinkles her nose. “Ew, get your own, then.” 

“Screw you, Kara, Uncle Danny said that I get to choose the toppings.” Tyler whines.

“For the last fucking time,” Dan growls. “It’s _Dan._ ” 

 

* * *

 

Navigating the consumption of pizza between a fourteen year old, a twelve year old, a nine year old, and a five year old is exactly as fucking pointless as it sounds. Eventually Dan gives up and lets Sophie’s kids order whatever the hell they want. At least the Brookheimer’s won’t have to worry about lunch tomorrow, at any rate, because they’ll have pizza leftovers for days.

The restaurant is full and noisy on a Friday evening, and there are TVs scattered all around, flashing sports scores and the evening news. A tension headache starts pounding between Dan’s eyes like a drill, the high-pitched fighting of Sophie’s kids boring into his head like a million angry wasps. Even Cassidy’s starting to look a bit overwhelmed by the sheer volume of insults flying back and forth, and she spent the first year and a half of her life on Selina Meyer’s second presidential campaign. (He wonders if this much exposure to her cousins is making her glad she doesn’t have siblings.)

Eating is no less chaotic than ordering. Sophie’s kids don’t even stop fighting while they’re devouring multiple pizzas. At some point during dinner, Kara spots some guy from her school that she has a crush on, and literally flees into the restaurant bathroom to avoid being seen in their company, which is _just_ fine with Dan, she can spend the rest of the meal hiding in there for all he cares. And then Alyssa accidentally-on-purpose gets pizza sauce on Tyler’s new phone case, and he tries to get Dan to give him another fifty bucks to buy another one.

“What? No, dude, come on, how dumb do you think I am?”

“Mom says you’re dumber than you look.” Alyssa pipes up cheerfully.

Dan tries to think of a way to respond that doesn’t involve obliquely referencing the fact that he and Sophie fucked once upon a time, can’t think of one, and instead just mutters “Nice,” into his pizza. That’s a minefield he wants to stay far the fuck away from, even though Cassie’s not listening to the conversation anymore. She’s clearly worn out, her cheeks flushed and her hair ribbon falling into her face as she watches CNN with her eyes glazing over.

“You look sad, Cassidy.” Kara comments as she returns to the table. “Cheer up—your mom’s on tv.”

“Mommy’s always on tv.” Cassie mumbles disdainfully, curling more comfortably into Dan’s side. 

Dan glances at the tv anyway, just to make sure CNN’s not having a slow-enough news day that  the death of the father of one of D.C.’s premier political strategists will be considered breaking news in any capacity. It’s not—just B-roll footage of Liz and Amy striding into a health-care town hall event last week in Buffalo. 

On their way out of the restaurant, they run into the local congressman Scott Blake, picking up his own pizza order. He’s a bit younger than Dan, mid thirties, with the vibe of an affable college athlete. He’s exactly the right mix of dumb and approachable that someone’s going to try to get him to run for governor or senator one day, and Dan figures they might as well get him in BKD’s pocket for when that day comes. Ignoring Sophie’s fidgeting brood behind him, he stops and chats for a few moments—he might as well get _something_ out of this fucking hellish outing. 

“How’s Amy doing?” Blake asks, once they’ve spent a few minutes abusing Jonah, which is everyone’s new favorite pastime on the Hill.

“Uh…” Amy will kill him if he says anything about her dad. “…fine, she’s fine, you know, busy with the bill.”

“Oh, well, hey, let me know if you need anything. I was thinking, you guys should come over for dinner sometime, my wife would love to meet Amy, and we could talk shop, I’ve been thinking about changing up my media strategy actually…” 

“Yeah, yeah, _absolutely_ , Amy and I would love that, call my office, we’ll set it up.” It’s a complete bullshit response—Amy’s going to hate it, there are few things she despises more than spending whole evenings trapped in conversation with bland congressmen and their Xanaxed-to-fuck wives. That was one huge perk of actually making it official with her, though, finally getting a legally sanctioned entrée to the congressional social circuit. It’s astounding how many more invitations they get as a married couple.  

“And, uh, are these…these aren’t all your kids, are they?” the congressman asks uncertainly, looking behind at Dan at the line of Sophie’s kids. 

Dan laughs very loudly, just to make sure every single person within earshot knows that he considers this question fucking preposterous. 

“Nope, _fuck_ no, absolutely not, just this one here.” At his side, on cue, Cassidy leans against Dan’s leg and smiles angelically up at both men, a bit sleepily to be sure, but somehow it just magnifies the effect, with her huge Amy-eyes and cheeks flushed with exhaustion. 

Blake whistles, which...is kind of a weird reaction, but Dan'll take it. “Of course, how did I not guess, she looks just like you, Egan.”

“So they say.” he replies, because it's not like this is an uncommon reaction or anything. “This is Cassidy.”   

Cassidy says, sweetly and unprompted, “Hello, congressman,” and Blake looks suitably impressed. Of course, he’s unaware that “congress” was literally Cassidy’s third word, after “Mama” and “election” (“Dada” was her fifth word, which Dan is still bitter about. Her fourth word was “fuck.”). 

“Wow, I can’t even get my son to look people in eye.” he comments dryly. “Quite the kid you’ve got here.” 

“Yeah, I do.” Dan says, grinning proudly down at Cassie, who’s preening at the compliment even as she fights a yawn. 

Behind them, Kara demands loudly, “God, why are we stuck in this fucking doorway, can we please _go_?”

 

* * *

 

By the time they get back to the house, it’s fully dark and Dan is so exhausted it’s a miracle he doesn’t park the car on the lawn. Sophie’s kids have finally ( _finally)_ fallen silent, and Cassidy’s dozing off in the backseat. Dan’s too tired to deal with the effort of waking her up and getting her to walk, so he just picks her up and carries her into the house himself.

The lower floor of the house is pitch black when they get in, but low light glows from the second floor landing. Sophie’s kids, whispering among themselves, troop up the stairs and Dan follows them, zombie-like, concentrating on not tripping over his feet. The landing is lit by the strips of dull lamplight underneath all the closed doors. Amy’s door is ajar—so she can hear if her mom calls for her, or waiting for them, he’s not sure. 

Amy’s slumped on the edge of her bed, her forehead in her hands. She’s changed out of her work clothes into leggings and oversized sweater. In the corner, there’s a small suitcase, lying open, and two dry-cleaner bags hanging on the closet door, holding, from what he can tell, changes of clothes for both of them.

She glances up as Dan carefully makes his way into the room, Cassie still slumped against his shoulder, and the expression on her face as she takes them in is uncharacteristically soft, her eyes as bright as they were when she talked to Cassidy on the playground. He walks over to the bed, preparing to drop Cass (carefully) next to Amy, but Amy stands before he can do so, reaching out and pushing Cassidy’s hair back from her forehead. Cassidy’s eyelids flicker open, and she shifts automatically towards Amy, reaching out a hand. 

“Do you feel better, Mommy?” she asks, before Amy can say anything, and Amy’s face, if possible, goes even more soft. Dan’s heart thumps against his ribcage—if he could, he’d put his arms around Amy too, and just _hold_ them all together, in this weird but cozy silent glow that’s envelopped Amy’s old bedroom, where the walls have remained literally untouched since she graduated high school. 

“A little, baby.” Amy whispers in return. “Let’s get you ready for bed. You can tell me about your day.” Gently, she and Dan maneuver Cassidy into her arms—even though Cassie’s really getting too big for Amy to hold now—and goes back into the hallway. 

Once the door closes behind them, Dan immediately falls onto the bed in his clothes, too tired to contemplate getting changed or checking his phone or doing anything that requires expending further energy. Fuck, he is so fucking exhausted, it seems like fucking one hundred years since they woke up this morning, the day has been _endless._ He thought he’d sort of gotten a handle on dealing with other people’s emotions—he’s raising a five year old and he works with _politicians,_ for fuck’s sake—but Amy’s dad dying is clearly something else entirely. It’s like walking around in the wreckage of a fire. 

He rolls over and stares up at a shelf of Amy’s old student council awards, next to some framed photos of her debate team at a school dance. High-school-Amy stares down at him, still managing to look intensely serious and business-like with butterfly clips in her hair and wearing an orange slip dress that Amy today wouldn’t be caught dead in. 

He’s still lying there when Amy returns fifteen minutes later. She sits down next to him on the bed, cross-legged. “Cassidy’s already asleep,” she reports. “What the hell did you do with them all afternoon?” 

“Took them to the mall.” he yawns. “Bribed them.”

“Is this a new parenting technique you’ve picked up?”

“Not new.” He rolls back over so he can rest his head in her lap—Amy rearranges her legs—and wraps one arm around her waist, settling in to rest against her. She’s warm and soft and whatever she’s wearing carries the faint scent of their house, something woodsy, with a hint of Amy’s perfume. Amy touches his jawline softly, rubbing her fingertips along his day-old beard stubble, and he closes his eyes at the sensation. For a while, they just sit like that, entwined and silent. It’s kind of rare for them to ever just be…still. (If he weren’t so tired, he’d probably find it too weird.)

“Sophie’s kids?” he says after a while, still keeping his eyes closed. “Are _never_ allowed to babysit Cass. They’re all borderline certifiable. Well, not the youngest one. The oldest two.”

“Mmm.” she replies, a little absently.

“I mean, obviously they’re related to Sophie, which I guess isn’t _technically_ their fault, but seriously, you couldn’t even tell something bad had happened today, they’re all, like, baby sociopaths.” 

“Dan,” Amy says, and he can hear her smirking in that way she does when she thinks he’s being particularly dumb, and is enjoying it. 

“What?” he says, finally opening his eyes, and yes, she’s grinning down at him with that perfectly Amy expression of affection and exasperation. 

“They’re _teenagers_. That’s why they’re assholes. Cassidy will be an asshole too when she’s that age. We’re going to want to lobotomize her, that’s how infuriating she’s going to be.” 

“Shit,” he mutters. “Are you kidding me?”

“No, you dumbass. It’s something all kids go through. Even _your_ kid.” 

“Jesus, no wonder Sophie’s gotten crazier with age.” 

“Yeah, well, that’s one excuse, I guess.” 

“Maybe Cassidy won’t be so bad.” 

Amy snorts. “Who the hell do you think you are? She’s got half your DNA.” 

“Because _you_ were such a model teenager,” he teases, squeezing her waist. 

“Shut the fuck up, Dan.” But her voice is fond, and her fingers move slowly into his hair, and it feels so good that normally he’d yank her face down to his so they could start making out, but it’s like all his limbs have been de-boned, he’s so tired and comfortable, the idea of moving seems impossible. 

He’s almost asleep when Amy says, more quietly. “Rebecca brought clothes.” Rebecca’s her super-assistant. 

“I noticed.” he mumbles. 

“She brought things for you too, I don’t know if you want to stay—“

It takes his exhausted brain a second to process what she’s saying. “…What?”

Her fingers stop moving through his hair. “I mean, you don’t have to stay if you don’t want to. It’s barely nine.” Her leg has tensed underneath him, and, now that her lap is no longer so comfortable, Dan rolls away from her, pushing himself to a sitting position so he can look her fully in the face. 

“So…” he begins, slowly. “Cassie is here and you’re here, and you think I’m going to _go?_ ” The exhaustion prickles into something harder: annoyance, disbelief. Amy just looks at him, confused and wary, and for some reason it just pisses him off more.

“No, I just wasn’t sure—“

“I just spent all fucking afternoon babysitting Sophie’s delinquent teenagers—who, by the way, won’t stop calling me _Danny_ —” He is too fucking tired to keep the anger in his voice under control, because how the fuck can she think he's _leaving_ now, after all that?! 

Amy recoils, sitting back on her heels. “I don’t want—“

“And you think I’m going to run home _now_ , like some fucking puppy with my tail between my legs? Do you think I’m one of Sophie’s rotating fuckboys?” 

Like she’s been hit with boiling water, Amy jumps to her feet, her face shuttering down so fast it’s like a window has slammed shut behind her eyes. “Oh my god, I am not fucking dealing with you like this, one child is fucking _enough._ ” 

Her voice has that cramped sound it always gets when she’s fighting back tears, and in that split-second, he realizes what he’s done. Shit. “Amy—“ he sighs, reaching for her. 

“Stay or go, I don’t give a fuck.” she practically spits at him, and she’s gone. The bedroom door slams behind her, before he’s even really realized what’s happened, and the silence in its wake echoes in his head. 

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Dan collapses back onto the bed and groans into a pillow. “ _Fuckkkkk._ ” His indignation has flared out, as suddenly as it erupted, and now he just feels…dumb.

Of all the fucking days to really pick a fight with Amy. Jesus. He wasn’t even _thinking_ about her dad. He’s just exhausted, and his nerves are fucking on end, and he definitely didn’t need Amy to try and send him home— _you know she wasn’t doing that, dickhead,_ echoes an annoying voice at the back of his mind—after he’d spent what felt like _a whole damn day_ managing a subset of her crazy-ass family. And he reacted to her the way he’d react during any other disagreement, on any other day. 

The fucking ironic part of it all is that he does want to go home, like, so badly he can taste it, he wants to get out the hell of this house. He wants to take Amy and Cassidy back home, _their_ home, and let the rest of the Brookheimers deal with this on their own, and he wants it all the more because right now he obviously _can’t_.

“Shit.” he mutters again, before pushing himself up and looking for his phone.

In the suitcase that Rebecca delivered, he finds multiple changes of clothes, including a pair of his sweatpants, and some toiletries (although she only packed a small fraction of the products he uses on a nightly basis). He brushes his teeth in the spare bathroom and goes to check on Cassidy in the grandkids’ room. She’s sprawled out in her usual fashion all over her twin bed, so deeply asleep she doesn't even stir when he touches her head--Jesus, Sophie's kids must have worn her out, it's usually takes forever for her to settle down.

Back in Amy’s room, he paces for a few minutes, restless and energetic, riding the final waves of adrenaline that his fight with Amy has kicked up. There’s nothing like Amy getting in his face to get his blood going—as tired as he is, he can’t fall asleep _now._

Eventually, he digs his iPad out of his bag, rearranges all the pillows on Amy’s bed, and gets to work. What else is he going to do? 

An hour later, after he’s made sure nothing about Amy’s dad has leaked in the blogosphere and caught up on emails and responded to Kent’s weekly summary, Amy hasn’t returned.

Where the fuck did she go? Presumably she’s back in her mom’s room. He doesn’t think she’s left the house. He would have heard the car start, for one thing. Unless she went for a walk? Fuck, did he miss the sound of the front door? Just because they’re stuck out here in the Maryland suburbs didn’t mean it’s a good idea for her to go on midnight walks all by her self. 

He thinks about calling her, and then realizes he has no idea if she has her phone on her, which…shit, when does Amy not have her phone? Was losing her dad and then getting into a fight with husband enough to make her lose all sense? And if she does have her phone, and she’s with her mom, that’s definitely not going to make him look any better. 

Another hour later, after he’s refreshed Twitter fourteen times and reviewed all his mentions and then, because he’s still awake, drafted a media strategy to fend off potential primary challengers in the New York 6th, Amy still hasn’t come back. 

By a quarter after midnight, he’s lying flat on his back, staring at the ceiling, his phone glowing in his hand, still feeling useless and pissed off and restless. It’s a much smaller bed than theirs back at the house. Lying spread-eagled, he’s basically takes up the entire mattress. Amy’s going to be pissed when she comes to bed. If she comes to bed tonight. 

He’s got no fucking clue what comes next. How to handle Amy going through something like this, losing her father. Figuring out how to raise Cassidy is difficult and frustrating and takes up every damn spare minute they have and, yeah, it’s a fucking emotional roller coaster all on its own, but it’s also…good. They’re in it together. 

But this is different. This is all Amy, her own grief, her own memories, parts of her life that don’t belong to him at all, parts of her life he hasn’t ever _cared_ about before now. 

Kara’s ominous words from earlier that day filter through his memory— _Mom totally knew it was coming—something was going to happen_ …shit, he can’t even begin to think about how to deal with that, if he has to deal with it at all. The exhaustion washes back over him, draining his ability to think, and he turns to bury his face in the pillow, willing Amy to come back...it's not that he can't sleep without her...it's just that he's so used to her presence in his bed...

* * *

 

Dan wakes suddenly to a nearly pitch-black room, forgetting for a second where he is. There’s searing white patches of moonlight on the bedspread, so bright they dazzle his eyes, and the rest of the room is pitch black, so that black and white squares seems to dance before his eyes, temporarily blinding him. 

The mattress has dipped: Amy’s crawling over him, her hair glinting in the moonlight. Dan can still barely see, but he reaches out for her instinctively. She curls up against him like a cat, enfolds herself into his arms and presses her face against his shoulder.

“Ames, I’m—“ he mumbles, pulling her as close as possible, breathing her in. 

“It doesn’t matter.” she whispers. He can feel her eyelashes against his skin. “It doesn’t fucking matter, Dan. You stayed.”

It feels like he’s underwater, her skin and her scent the only real things right now. He might even be dozing off again when he mumbles, “Of course I stayed,” into the soft skin of her neck. 

She exhales against him, a long quavery breath. “Yeah,” she breathes, and that’s the last thing he remembers before they sleep.   
  
*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't as polished as I would like, but I wanted to get it up as soon as it was readable. I so appreciate everyone's patience with my slow updating, and I hope you'll stick with me :-) xo


	5. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Counting down to March 31st! Sadly, there’s a zero percent chance this story will be completed by then--it is clearly turning into a monster—so I guess it will officially become an ‘AU’. 
> 
> My goal is to finish this (one day) regardless of what happens on the show, so I hope you’ll stick with me even after Veep has officially come to an end :-)

He always sleeps like crap at the Brookheimers.

For one thing, the mattress in Amy’s old bedroom fucking sucks.

The first night he ever spent there was Cassie’s first Christmas. She had been teething, an experience Dan has mostly blacked out of his memory. He and Amy had ended up passed out on the floor of the guest bedroom, next to Cassidy’s crib, too tired and out of it to make it back to bed, and it was only mildly less comfortable than the fucking mattress. Mr. Brookheimer had found them there in the morning, and had been weirdly smug about it, like it was confirmation that no funny (sexy) business had occurred under his own roof. 

The second time was Thanksgiving, after the 2022 midterms. That night had gone a lot better. He and Amy were both still on a total high: BKD dominated in the midterms, Liz was the most popular Senator in the country, press interest in the two of them as a political dream-team was rampant…it felt like everything had finally fallen into place. Even Mr. Brookheimer had seemed taken aback by how…happy his daughter was. At least, there had been fewer muttered asides about how Dan was the literal anti-Christ. Dan didn’t sleep well that night either—the mattress still sucked, for one thing—but only because he was too busy engaging in a long-held fantasy of fucking Amy all night in her old bedroom.

And now, two and a half years later, he’s blinking awake with his face in a pillow that smells different from his usual pillow, in a room that doesn’t smell like his and Amy’s room, doesn’t smell like a hotel, doesn’t even smell like Cassidy’s room so it takes him a minute to figure out where the hell he is. His back hurts.

He blinks again. Amy’s old prom photo comes back into focus.

Oh, _shit_ , Dan thinks, groggily, and shuts his eyes again. 

He’s at the Brookheimers. His back hurts because of this mattress hasn't been changed since 2002. And…Amy’s dad is dead. He’s not going to be around anymore, to interrogate Dan about how much money he’s putting away for Cassidy’s college fund each month and to hint to Amy that she and Cassie could _always_ come to the house if they needed “a break” from Washington (and, by extension, Dan). As though Amy had ever wanted a break from her job in her life. 

Amy’s lying in the crook of his elbow, facing away from him, the sheets tangled around her waist. He can tell right away she’s awake, her breathing too light and her body too tense. She came to bed still in her sweater from the night before, but she’s stripped it off—it’s hot, Dan suddenly realizes, because they're practically jammed together in a bed that's barely bigger than their couch. 

“Hey,” he mumbles, tilting his head forward to nudge at her neck, still mostly asleep (also his arm is _completely_ numb from the weight of her head, fuck, she must have used his bicep as a pillow all night). 

It takes her a moment to roll over and face him, and for a second he think she’s been looking at her phone. That would make sense, at least, it would almost be a relief. 

Instead, she looks pale and cold, in spite of the warmth of the blankets. She hasn’t been crying, but she has that still, almost expression-less look that he recognizes from the car yesterday. Amy’s gone quiet around him before, but he could always tell _why,_ because usually it was because she was keeping her rage clamped down, like a lid over a pot of boiling water, vibrating with fury. But this complete inner withdrawal, like there’s _nothing_ behind her stillness, like she’s coming back from a place he doesn’t know or can’t reach…he can’t help but hope she’ll get over this part soon, it makes him feel fucking uncertain, and he doesn’t like feeling that way around Amy. 

Her eyes move across his face, as though she’s taking him in a new way, here in her old bed in her old bedroom with the pale blue walls, where they both barely fit under the duvet.

“Hi,” she finally murmurs back. 

Impulsively, he cups his hand around the back of her head and kisses her. He means for it to be quick and gentle, reassuring, but Amy surpises him by sliding her hands up and over his chest and arching a little so that she’s pressed entirely against him. Dan shifts slightly so that he’s mostly on top, sliding a leg between hers, and that’s when Amy opens her mouth against his with a little moan, like she’s been holding something back until now. 

They make out like that for a little while, slow-burning and languid and a little messy. Gradually, Amy stops feeling so cold beneath him, as he works his hand under her tank-top to stroke at the soft skin of her waist and back. Dan’s brain is still fuzzy with sleep, so he’s moving off of pure instinct here, off of the sensation of Amy in his arms, the feel of grinding a little against his thigh, slow and lazy and perfect, and he doesn’t really give a shit about anything else. Touching her is the only thing that he knows how to do right now, and the way the tenor of her breathing shifts when he kisses his way down her neck lets him know that this approach is _much_ more effective than anything he could say. 

Eventually, though, Amy pulls away with a sigh. She looks a little more _alive_ now, her eyes brighter, and her cheeks flushed, and it’s almost perverse how reassured he is that he can still get a reaction from her. 

“You’re heavy,” she says, but no makes no move to push him away. In fact she’s keeping him anchored over her, with her fingers knotted loosely into his undershirt, as though he might take off at any moment.  

“I forgot how small this bed is,” he mutters. The corners of Amy’s lips tilt into an almost-smile. He traces his thumb over her bottom lip, red and slightly swollen from his kisses, and her eyelashes flutter in a way that makes him wonder how long it takes for grief-sex to be on the table. 

“Did you sleep?” he asks her. 

“A little,” she mumbles. “Mostly I was…thinking.” 

He doesn’t ask about what. Just pulls her a little closer (if such a thing is fucking possible in this damn bed). Amy doesn’t resist, just shuts her eyes and rearranges herself so her cheek is pressed against his shoulder. She doesn’t object when Dan reaches over to grab his phone. It’s still early, barely eight. The house is dead silent around them. He can hear Sophie snoring two bedrooms over, underneath the sleepy chirping of a bird outside. Amy certainly doesn’t seem like she’s inclined to move—she’s not even fidgeting, and she _still_ hasn’t grabbed for her own phone—so…he just skims Twitter with Amy tucked neatly into his side, tracing patterns between her shoulder blades while he catches up on the overnight foreign policy news. 

On a regular Saturday, a different sort of Saturday, at their real house back in Georgetown, they would all sleep in, each of them migrating downstairs at different paces. Cassidy was usually up first, to watch tv, and depending on how awake they were, Amy and Dan would send her downstairs or let her watch in their room. It was Dan’s responsibility to feed everyone on Saturday morning, so he usually got up second. If he went to the gym or for a run, sometimes he’d come back with breakfast, croissants or breakfast burritos. Amy was the late sleeper, stumbling downstairs still in her pajamas or a robe or whatever she’d thrown on after she and Dan had had sex. If they had to go in to work for an event or some political crisis, they’d call Jessica, or, more frequently now that she was in kindergarten, send Cassidy to a friend’s house for the afternoon. 

“Dan?” Amy asks, after a while. 

“Yeah?”

“…did anything happen with the bill?”

It actually takes Dan a second to remember what she’s talking about. There’s nothing in his inbox or on Twitter about Jonah or changes to the current support totals.

“…since midnight? Uh, no…”

“I have a meeting with Kasinski’s chief of staff later.” she explains. “It was scheduled yesterday morning. He’s about to go out of town on some co-del to—“

“I’ll cover it.” he says, automatically. “Have Rebecca send him to the office instead.”

“What…what should she tell him?” Amy asks, more quietly. She’s not looking at him—her eyes are focused on a point somewhere just above his sternum, as her fingers trace over the ribbed lines of his undershirt. 

“Tell him that he’s having the meeting with me and not you, it’s not fucking rocket science, he knows how this works.”

Amy bites her lip, clearly uncertain. Her eyes have got that slightly frozen look whenever she has to think about her family and her job in the same context. Luckily, this is a dilemma he _can_ fix: by telling it to her straight in bloodlessly cold, hard political terms, the language they both prefer speaking in, even to each other.

“Ames,” he begins, in his _I-can’t-believe-this-is-up-for-discussion_ tone. “Liz will go apeshit if it gets out you had a meeting with someone the day after your dad died.”A crucial part of Liz’s reputation on the Hill is that she treats her staff semi-decently while also being a tough-as-nails no-bullshit lady Senator, and she’s fucking obsessive about making sure nothing compromises that. Which means that Amy has to stay at home today, no matter what she actually wants to do. Dan’s not actually sure what she wants…but somehow, he doesn’t think Amy knows either, and he’s obviously _always_ happy to make decisions for both of them without having to go five fucking rounds like normal. 

“Okay.” she agrees, as meek as she's ever sounded. 

“And I’ll take Cassie with me,” he adds. “So we’ll be out of the way.” Dan’s not entirely sure what it is that Amy and her mom and her sister have to do today, but he’s pretty sure they’ve got some organizational—not to mention emotional—shit to figure out and he’d rather skip out on as much of it as possible. Start planning the funeral, he guesses? Or call more Brookheimers, maybe, if they haven’t notified everyone yet. Fuck. Thinking about how many more Brookheimers there might be in the world makes him feel ill.

Amy just tilts her head up and looks at him skeptically.

“I mean, I’ll take her _with_ me,” he says hastily. “I won’t have her in the meeting.” 

“What _ever._ ” she scoffs. “It’s a health care bill, he’ll see right through you anyway.”

There’s a rustle in the doorway as it swings open, the sound as familiar as his own breathing, he doesn’t even have to move to know what it is.  Cassidy, in her favorite ladybug pajamas and her hair all rumpled, rubbing her eyes.

“Mommy,” she calls softly, “Can I come in bed with you?”

“Yeah, come here.” Amy scoots back a few inches, so she’s no longer partially crushed by Dan, and throws the blankets aside. 

“I can hear Aunt Sophie snoring.” Cassidy grumbles, clambering over their legs. “She’s so loud.”

“She’s always snored like a fu—like a freight train.” Amy mutters. “You can sleep here for a little while longer, baby.”

Cassidy burrows her way into the small space between them, tucking her dark head under Amy’s chin and nestling against her like a kitten. She falls back asleep right away—her formative years spent on multiple campaign trails have instilled in her a supernatural ability to sleep almost anywhere instantly—and all three of them all lie there for a while as the room slowly lightens around them. Amy looks visibly less troubled as she runs a hand idly over her daughter’s hair, and, as he watches them, Dan thinks, _mine._

They’ve faced each other like this a thousand times, in their bed and countless hotel rooms, often with Cassie curled between them, but it feels…delicate now. Almost fragile. 

He doesn’t like it.

“God, I hope it was snoring she heard.” he mutters to Amy, more to distract himself than anything else.

Amy makes a comically horrified face at him. “ _Gross,_ shut up.” 

“At least when we did it here we were quiet.”

“Stop it.” Amy hisses, but she’s fighting a smile. “Sophie’s basically lives here now, which means her boyfriend is here too.” 

“Yeah, remind me to run a fucking background check on that guy, if he’s going to be around.” 

“Apparently he helps out around the yard.” Amy says, disdainfully, like the idea is a completely foreign one (Dan has obviously never touched anything in their yard). Then her expression changes, as though she’s realized something. Too slowly, it sinks into his brain that Mr. Brookheimer’s death means that Amy’s mother might move out of the house. Shit. Amy’s going to have manage that, isn’t she? He’s never gotten much of an impression of Mrs. Brookheimer’s practical life-skills.

“She’ll probably stay here for a while.” Amy whispers, reading his mind, and then grimaces. “It could take Sophie years to find an apartment, after all, she’ll drag that out as long as fucking possible.”

“ _Great,_ ” Dan says dryly, envisioning a whole year of Amy trapped in Maryland every damn weekend.

“I should go check on her.” Amy sighs. Carefully, she pushes herself into a sitting position, and grabs her for sweater. Immediately, Cassidy rolls into Amy’s warm spot in the bed, still dead asleep.

He stays in bed for a little while longer, skimming Twitter and listening to Cassidy breathe. Damn it, he probably needs to find someone to watch her for the afternoon. There’s no way he is spending another night on this fucking mattress, and if he leaves Cassidy in D.C. when he comes back for Amy, it will be a lot easier to extricate both of them. But if he’s taking her with him, he needs to get her up, and dressed…he has to find breakfast somewhere…somehow he needs to do all this without attracting attention from Sophie’s kids…

Sometimes he fucking _longs_ for the days when all he had to worry about was…himself. He could be out the door, on his way back to Washington, in five fucking minutes if he wanted. 

Still. Cassidy blinks awake a few minutes later, her big blue-gray eyes focusing on his face, and then she smiles at him like he’s the only thing in the world. “Hi, Daddy” she whispers. 

…it’s not terrible.

* * *

“Well, look who it is, Cassie B.” Ben greets them, poking his head out of his office. 

BKD is always fairly quiet on Saturdays, especially during the “off-season” (basically the first one hundred days of a new presidency, or, if you’re reaching, the six-month sweet-spot between the inauguration and the midterm pre-campaigning). There’s usually always an intern or two floating around, to keep an eye on Twitter and manage the crisis phone-line. Ben’s usually there too, just because he hates being in his own house. Today, he’s in his weekend uniform, a navy-blue button-down sweater and khakis. Dan called it his “grandpa cardigan” once and Ben threatened to sue him for his shares of the business. 

“My grandpa died.” Cassidy informs Ben, so solemn that he immediately blanches in horror and Dan has to smother his laugh in his coffee. Ben doesn’t mind whenever Dan has to bring Cassidy to the office, out of some repressed fatherly feelings toward Amy probably. But he can never handle it whenever she does anything that reminds him she’s actually a _child_ and not a fully grown yet miniature substitute for her parents.

“Uh yeah, that, uh, that is, uh, really sad, I was sorry to hear that.” He glances at Dan suspiciously. “Speaking of which, what are you doing here?”

“I’m covering Amy’s meeting with Kasinki’s COS. Why, do you want to see my permission slip?” 

“Just checking.” Ben says, all-faux innocently, like he wouldn’t fire Dan in instant (if he could) and beg Amy to take his place. “I’m around, if you need me. Hey, Cassie B, do you want some candy?”

“Oooh, yes!” she exclaims, lighting up, and darts down the hallway into Ben’s office. 

Dan arches an eyebrow. “It’s ten fifteen in the morning, Ben.”

“Oh get the fuck over yourself.” Ben retorts, which is what he always says in response to Amy and Dan’s vague attempts to shield their daughter from the terrible social and behavioral habits of the infantile adults who populate their political world. “A little bourbon-flavored butterscotch never killed anyone.”

“What the—fine, whatever, one alcoholic butterscotch, twenty bucks says she spits it back out on your floor. Fair warning, most kids don’t like the taste of bourbon.”

“Whatever.” Ben scoffs. “They have to learn sometime.” 

Fifteen minutes later, Cassie trots into Dan’s office holding a crisp twenty dollar bill and looking impossibly smug. With that expression on her face, it’s like looking in a damn mirror. 

“Whatcha got there, kiddo?”

“Ben says this is for you to buy me and Mommy something nice.” she says, diabolically angelic as she hands him the bill.

“For only twenty bucks? Ben’s a cheapskate.” 

“What’s a…cheapskate?”

“It means Ben’s paying for lunch, honey.”

Cassie thinks about that for a second, then says, “So next time…we ask him for more money?"

“That’s my girl.” Dan smirks. 

* * *

The meeting with Kasinski’s chief of staff is fine, but someone, probably some minor intern in Halliday’s office who Amy is definitely going to fire, has leaked the news about Amy’s dad, and Kasinski knows. Which isn’t, like a huge deal—it’s not going to really impact the bill, one way or another, but it’s going to make Amy furious that her personal life is in any way part of the gossip circus on the Hill. For now, it means that Dan can use the news to his advantage without feeling too guilty about it. He spins a whole sob story about the sad state of American health care and the importance of a reform in this moment of American history and how his daughter no longer has a grandfather that she loves, blah blah blah blah. 

He makes sure to use the conference room right next to his office, so that Cassidy is visible through the walls, and sets her up with some silver dry erase markers he bought her one day when her babysitter came down with the flu, Amy was out of town and he was stuck at work in a late meeting and desperate for a way to entertain her. So, Cassie spends the meeting placidly coloring on his office walls, and doing it while looking like the poster child for the healthy future of America. Kasinski’s COS eats it up, and with his support, that brings their Senate vote total to 54-46. Still not veto-proof, though. 

After the meeting, he and Cassidy go for lunch at “their” usual deli over on J Street—steak sandwich with a salad for Dan, grilled ham and cheddar panini for Cassidy, and he grabs a sandwich for Amy too, because the odds of her having eaten a full meal in the last twenty fours are…minimal, to say the least. To drag it out as long as possible before he has to go back to Maryland, they walk over to Lafayette Square and he lets Cassidy feed the ducks in the pond with the leftover sandwich bread.

Dan would never tell anyone this, obviously, but he doesn’t hate spending time with his kid. He loves her—of course he loves her, he wants to protect her and leave her a lot of money when he eventually dies and all that shit—but more than all that, he doesn’t actually mind being alone with her without Amy around. 

A kid had never been part of the plan. Amy had been, sort of, by then, in some sort of vague way, he had always kind of pictured her…around. But a kid? Never.

Even when once he came around to the idea (once he realized all the golden political advantages a baby would bring him, especially a baby that would tie him to Amy permanently), it didn’t change the fact that babies were…still _fucking_ dull. Baby-Cassie just lay around and cried for him or Amy to pay attention to her and chattered away in this alien baby language that for the life of him he could never fucking decode (he practically cried tears of joy the day she started speaking real words). Then she grew into a toddler and learned how to walk and talk a little, and it was the exact same shit except _worse_ because she could get into trouble on her own, like the time she got herself stuck in a storage closet at Madison Square Garden during a celebrity get-out-the-vote rally with Liz.

But _now,_ Cassidy’s like, a real person, with a fully-fledged personality and her own thoughts, and they can actually…talk to each other. It’s obvious that she inherited a significant amount of his evil genius in addition to his looks, and she’s actually hilarious and already has a higher vocabulary than most congressmen. He and Amy produced a real banger of a kid, that’s for sure (not that he expected otherwise…but now he can be _real_ smug about it). He won’t even have to pull that many strings to get her into a good college. 

He never thought he’d turn into the kind of asshole who wants to spend actual time with his kid when he could be working or fucking or drinking, but….he didn’t expect a kid, either.  

And of course, while they’re at the park, he tweets a picture of her feeding the ducks, because having a kid has done fucking _wonders_ for his career, and Amy’s, beyond his wildest dreams. The DC media chatter around them always skyrockets whenever he tweets about the three of them behind the scenes at a political event, or even something as minor as going to the park. Amy gets a ton of press interest as a working mother and it’s a huge part of Liz’s brand too, and all that happy-working-family shit _will_ be a part of her future presidential campaign, since Amy and Dan are obviously going to run it. Dan’s careful about posting, has to be—can’t show too much, or the narrative will get tired—but even one photo of Cassie and Amy together gives them enough momentum for weeks. 

When he can’t put if off any longer, he drops Cassidy off at her friend Ava’s house for the afternoon before heading back out to Maryland. Ava’s father is a pharmaceutical lobbyist and her mother works in Treasury, so he hangs around for a bit, chatting about the health care bill and trying to suss out just how pissed off the pharmaceutical industry is going to be if the bill passes. 

Back at the Brookheimer’s, there’s another car parked in the driveway, and he assumes some relatives have already descended on the house, cousins or aunts and uncles, whoever-the-fuck. He checks his reflection in the mirror of the car, fiddles with his sleeves and his hair, flashes himself a practice smile, just in case he has to spend the afternoon impressing, or possibly distracting, some new (presumably female) Brookheimers. He hadn’t bothered with a suit for the Kasinski meeting, and Amy’s assistant hadn’t sent along his shaving kit, so he’s in what Amy calls his “douchey professor” look and which Dan prefers calls his “modern homage” to Indiana Jones: a blazer, light sweater, no tie, jeans. 

But inside, instead of a cabal of female relatives, he finds Amy alone in the living room. Except she’s not alone—next to her, on the sofa, there’s a strange man around their age leaning toward her, so close their knees are bumping together. 

 _What the fuck?_ He drops his bag on the kitchen island with a loud thump; the new guy has the courtesy to straighten in his seat, startled. “I’m back, Ames.” 

 _“_ Oh. Hey.” Amy says, all casual, like he’d just run out to buy milk instead of taking extremelyconsequential political meetings. “How did it go?”

Dan ignores that. Turns out it’s still a good thing he checked his appearance outside, if only because the contrast between him and this bottom-feeder—who is wearing a backwards baseball cap in a house of mourning, for fuck’s sake, like a _peasant_ —is going to be all the more clear. 

“Am I interrupting something?” he asks, baring his teeth in his most predatory television smile, moving over toward the couch. 

Amy sits up straighter and glares warningly at him.“This is Dan. He means hello.” she explains, exasperatedly. She doesn’t even have the decency to look embarrassed or abashed by the situation, and Dan glances at her irritatingly. She’s wearing an old high school sweater she must have found in her closet—it’s so worn, it’s sliding off one of one shoulder, revealing the smooth line of her collarbone, and somehow that seems overly intimate in the presence of this fucking _stranger._

On the coffee table, there’s an elaborate, flowery confection of tulips and daffodils, with a note attached. Jesus fucking Christ, Amy’s dad has been dead for twenty four hours and random men are already coming out of the damn woodwork with _flowers_.

“Oh, yes, hi.” The man stands and holds out a hand. “Dan Egan, of course, I recognize you from TV. You were on CBS _This Morning_ , right?”

They size each other up over the couch. The new guy’s tall, but not as tall as Dan, with thinning blonde hair. The beginnings of a beer gut, but not particularly large otherwise—skinny, even. Not unattractive. He looks like a television producer’s idea of a bartender, or maybe a math teacher. He’s wearing _flannel,_ for fuck’s sake.

“Before I returned to more lucrative opportunities in politics, yes, I was on CBS for a very brief period. But I really do most of my television work on CNN these days.”

Amy visibly rolls her eyes in disgust. “Dan, this is Cal Hunter. We went to high school together.”

“Oh, Amy, I think we were more than just classmates.” Cal says, and Amy’s cheeks turn pink. It all clunks into place, and Dan flicks her a quick _you’ve got to be fucking kidding me_ look. Where the hell does Amy _find_ these people, did she ever date anyone who hasn’t turned into a complete fucking creep about her? If he’d known he was going to have spend the rest of his life fending off an endless string of non-entity exes he’d have given her a much bigger engagement ring, for fucking starters. Clearly he was _mistaken_ to choose something that she actually liked but that is _obviously_ ineffective at warning away dead-end bartenders or whatever the fuck this guy does for a living. He just should have gotten her the biggest fucking diamond in DC, like every other unimaginative sap in Washington.

Amy’s radiating powerful _behave yourself_ vibes in his direction, and he can see her to start to puff up with irritation. Fine. He can play nice. He goes on TV for a living and destroys people on air and he does it with a smile so devastating it’s won him fucking awards. He can play so nicely, this guy won’t even know he’s being slowly shredded in real time.

“Aww, hey man, I’m sorry…Ames has never mentioned you.”

“Oh—she hasn’t—“ What’s-his-name looks disconcerted, which means he’s got no poker face, which means he was _definitely_ never worth Amy’s time. “Well, it was a long time ago now.”

“So, what do you do, _Cal?_ ”

“I teach government and economics at the same high school Amy and I attended.”

“How exciting. You know, of course, that Amy actually _works_ in the government.”

“And when I heard about Amy’s dad, of course I just came right over.”

“I bet you did.” He’s laying on the sarcasm pretty thick by now, and the guy hasn’t picked up on it.

“We were here all the time as teenagers, practicing for the debate team and Model United Nations. Her father was an amazing man. We were very close.”

“ _Were_ you?” He really wishes Cassidy were here, running around as the physical proof that he and Amy were fucking. Right now he wishes they had _ten_ children and that Amy was hugely pregnant.

 _“_ Um, Dad and Cal liked to talk about fishing.” Amy elaborates.

“That definitely sounds like something you were interested in.” he deadpans in response, and Cal doesn’t get it, but he can see Amy bite the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.

“Anyway, so we were just catching up. We really don’t talk enough, Amy.”

“Well, by _all_ means, don’t let me get in the way.” Dan says sarcastically, but then immediately follows it up with: “Ames, where’s your mom?”

Amy gives him a suspicious look. “Upstairs, taking a nap. Where’s Cass?”

“At the Parkingtons until six. We can pick her up on the way home.”

“How was the meeting?” she asks again.

“We’re fine. He’s on board.”

Cal doesn’t appear to like the direction of the conversation, private, domestic chatter that he can’t participate in. “That’s so wonderful you finally have a child, Amy.” he intervenes, with the air of one grasping for straws. “I remember you didn’t always think that motherhood was for you.”

It’s a pretty ballsy comment from a guy who hasn’t spoken to Amy in at least fifteen years. Even Dan doesn’t go around commenting on other people’s parenting decisions—not to their faces, anyway. And Amy’s _definitely_ not one of those mothers who can’t ever shut up about being a mom and how magical it is to have biologically created new life or whatever the fuck. Amy wanted a kid, but she had always been pretty clear-eyed about messy and hard it was going to be, and she _definitely_ had no illusions about not screwing it up a good chunk of the time. Plus, Dan’s always known—and made a point to be smug about—about the fact that Amy kept _his_ kid, when there’s no fucking way she would have kept Buddy’s or Ed’s or any of the other losers she wasted her time on.

“Yeah, well.” she shrugs, looking uncomfortable for the first time. “I was surprised too.”

Dan smirks and folds his arms, leaning back against the kitchen island. “Maybe she just needed to meet the right guy, _Cole_.” (He doesn’t need to know that Cassie is almost entirely the product of the prospect of jail time, an incomplete medical diagnosis, and three-quarters of a bottle of scotch.)

“Uh, it’s Cal.” he corrects. “Well, I better go.”

Amy walks him to the front door (Dan follows, of course). In the entryway Cal turns to her and says, “Anything you need, Amy, please don’t hesitate to call at any time. I’m always here for you.”

“Of course.” she smiles.

“Don’t wait up.” Dan mutters, pretending to look at his phone. Amy elbows him in the side.

“Nice to meet you, Dan.”

“Goodbye, _Chad._ ” he calls in return, waving obnoxiously over Amy’s shoulder.

The minute the door closes, Amy says, in a completely flat tone of voice, “Dan, would it have killed you to not be your fucking self for three whole minutes of conversation?”

Dan lets out a bark of derisive laughter, and he can practically see Amy’s hackles rise in response, like an angry cat. “Please, Ames, there’s no way _I’m_ the bad guy in what just happened here.”

“He’s just an old friend from high school.”

“Yeah, an _old friend_ who has obviously spent the last twenty years jerking off to all your fun debate team memories. What were you, his first?”

“Don’t be gross.” she scoffs at him and turns away to go back to the kitchen.

Dan follows at her heels. Obviously he has no real intention of dropping anything. “Seriously, what the fuck is it with you and tall stringy guys who look like off-brand cowboys on a low-budget porn set?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Buddy, Cal, _Ed…_ it’s like the cast list from the Not-So-Magnificent Seven.”

“His full name was Edward, actually.” Amy replies, like that’s actually the point of the conversation. “Did you bring me a sandwich from the J-street place?”

Dan rummages in his bag for the sandwich he bought her earlier, and tosses it to her. “You’re welcome. And you’re not getting out of the question.”

On the other side of the kitchen island, Amy puts down her food with a sigh and stares at him for a few seconds. Then she says, slowly, “Your name is _Dan.”_

“So?”

“So it’s the most basic name on the planet.”

 _That_ wipes the smirk off his face. “What the—Amy!” he practically yelps at her.

“It’s as basic as the fucking Sears catalogue, but I married you anyway, you colossal prick, for reasons past understanding. Is this really something you want to talk about now?”

Fuck, this is why they can never get divorced. Amy’s the only one in the damn world who knows how to throw him off-balance with one tiny yet somehow perfectly aimed insult (it’s pretty twisted that he finds it super hot). “Uh, that all this time you thought my _name_ was stupid, yes, I fucking do!”

“Dan, I swear to god, if you don’t let me eat this in peace—“

Then he remembers something. “Wait a minute—“

He darts around the couch toward the coffee table. Amy, a second too slow on the uptake, gasps and dives after him and just manages to reach his heels as he lunges for the note that came with the flowers.

“Dan—don’t you dare—“

“I want to see what he wrote!” he exclaims, holding the note away from her.

“I haven’t even read it yet, you…scruffy-looking…caveman!” She leaps up on the couch, trying to snatch the note from over his shoulders. She’s so much shorter than him that it makes practically no difference.

“Who’s scruffy-looking?” He ducks her scrabbling hands and Amy jumps onto his shoulders, fingernails digging into his skin. “Ow—Amy—shit, fine, we can read it _together—_ ” 

“You—under-evolved—reptilian—”

He shakes it open. Amy’s still wriggling around trying to snatch it.

“ _Dearrrrr_ Amy,” he dramatically reads aloud, enunciating every syllable. “Anything I can do for you. All my love, _Cal_.” He tosses it disdainfully back onto the coffee table. “Wow, he didn’t even mention your mom or Sophie. Classy guy, Ames.”

Amy’s stilled on his back, her chin resting on his shoulder. “Would you and your lizard reflexes fucking calm down if I told you we literally have not spoken since my high school graduation?”

“Me, jealous of that guy?” He playfully tackles her to the couch, letting his body press hers back into the cushions. Amy squeaks in fake outrage, even as she hooks a leg around his thigh, pulling him closer.

“Oh _please_ , you got off on that whole conversation.”

He thrusts up into her a bit, he can’t help it, and then tilts his head to kiss her neck. “Mmm, I could get off now with a little help from you.”

“Gross,” she lightly punches him in the shoulder. “What is it with you and fucking in this house?”

“Do _not_ tell me you ever fucked that loser here—” he growls, nipping her ear.

“You met my dad, did you think I could ever sneak a boy into my bedroom?”

They’ve been sort of tussling with each other up until this point, but Amy stops mid-laugh and then suddenly goes still with a little gasp, as though she’s just remembered what’s happened, as though she’d forgotten. He'd forgotten too. Suddenly it’s like all the air has iced over in the living room.

Dan freezes too, moving his head back to look at her face. Fuck. Fuck.

“Shit.” she mutters quietly into his shoulder, squeezing her eyes shut, as though to block back tears.

“Ames,” he begins, without really any idea of what to say next.

“It’s fine—“ she insists, turning her head away so he can’t see the sudden twist in her face. Her body has gone rigid in his arms.

“Jesus, it’s _me,_ you can let yourself—“

The front door bangs opens, followed by a stampede of footsteps.

“Amy, where’s—oh my god, are you two having sex?”

“No!” Amy snaps at the same time Dan says, “Yes, go away.”

Amy pushes at his chest, practically writhing beneath him. “We’re _not,_ Dan, get up.”

“I’m getting—”

“Whatever, you two sort yourselves out, I’m going upstairs to check on Mom.”

“Sophie, she’s sleepi _—_ don’t fucking _wake_ her—”

Amy practically knees him in the stomach in her haste to dart after Sophie, and it’s extremely obvious she’s trying to get away from him as quickly as possible, because god forbid she gets caught having a real fucking emotion in front of him about her dead father. Dan knows—he _knows—_ she’s sticking so close to her mom and Sophie because around them she has to be functional and in-charge and she can’t keep up the façade around him, because Amy’s never been able to hide how she feels about _anything_ from him. Dan’s the fucking last person in the world to want to talk about _feelings_ _—_ and shit, it’s not like he even really wants to sit around and listen to Amy ramble about the first time her dad took her to the Library of Congress or whatever the fuck—but she can’t be whipping the Senate into shape and plotting to end Jonah’s presidency if she doesn’t deal with this straight on.

Which is why, presumably, he’s back here, and not at the office. But he can’t bring himself to leave, not without Amy.

After a few more minutes of glowering at the ceiling, he finally straightens up off the couch, only to realize he’s not alone in the living room anymore. Tyler’s slumped at the kitchen island, staring at his phone and feeding himself Cheetos one-handed.

“Oh shit,” Dan mutters, and flops over onto his back again.

“Hey, Danny.” Tyler says.

“It’s—fuck it, _hi,_ Tyler.”

And then, he gets the kind of brainwave that’s the reason he’s got a corner office on K-Street, over-charging politicians desperate for his advice, the type of brilliant epiphany that just confirms his own special brand of diabolical genius. Maybe he _can_ get some work done this afternoon, after all.

“Hey, Tyler…you’re on Twitter right?”

* * *

It doesn’t take Dan long to harness Tyler and his basement army of computer nerds and get them to start spamming Jonah’s personal Twitter account with #healthcarereformnow and #proveterans hashtags, plus some negative insults for a good measure, like #presidentofprisons. Then the whole movement starts trending on Twitter, and Jonah of course completely loses his proverbial shit and goes on a deranged rant about how the entire “Internet” has turned on him, and by the end of the day, the “online swell of support” for Liz Halliday’s health-care reform bill gets two minutes during CNN’s first news show of the evening. Not a bad day’s work considering he’s stuck in a Maryland suburb with only a pimply twelve-year old as his substitute staff. 

It’s the kind of win that Amy would be stoked about if she had the bandwith. But while he and Tyler are busy manipulating Twitter for the benefit of the American people, Amy’s busy with Sophie and her mother, wandering in and out of the kitchen and up and down the stairs, on the phone with various relatives and old friends and colleagues of Mr. Brookheimer. She and Sophie snipe at each other and Mrs. Brookheimer gets weepy whenever they do. Dan and Tyler eventually escape to the basement, which is where Mr. Brookheimer always disappeared to whenever he was overwhelmed by all the women in his household, and there’s _definitely_ some kind of irony here that Dan’s not going to think too hard about.

Anyway, he’s profoundly fucking grateful when five-thirty rolls around and he has to remind Amy that they have to go pick up Cassidy. He gets the feeling Mrs. Brookheimer kind of wants to be alone, actually, if the way she insists that Amy _not_ spend the night in Maryland is any indication, although she does tell both of them to bring Cassie back later in the week.

It feels like his one-hundredth car ride out of Maryland in the past few days. He wants to boast in detail to Amy about his Internet win against Jonah today, but Amy’s too exhausted to be as excited as he thought…and she spends the entire car ride on her phone with Liz anyway, talking about the override strategy in case Jonah vetos their bill. Cassidy’s wiped out too—she and Ava apparently spent the entire afternoon choreographing a dance to the title song from the latest mindless animated film that’s been making the rounds. Dan never in his life thought he'd have to know or care about what movies are interesting to five-year olds, but here they fucking are.

Their house has that dusty stillness of long absence when they open the door, even though just barely thirty six hours have passed.

Dan likes their house. After Selina lost her reelect campaign and they finally could stop living out of suitcases in Amy’s old apartment, he finally was able to go looking for a real place. It’s a three-stories, identical on the outside to every other luxury brick townhouse in the city: steps leading down to the sidewalk, a large maple tree nodding against the front windows of the living room. But the previous owners knocked out a bunch of walls on the lower floor to let in more light and make the space airy and expansive, stripped the walls to reveal (and redo) the original brick underneath and updated the appliances, so it’s the perfect blend of that trendy shabby-chic aesthetic plus enough sleek and shiny modern conveniences to satisfy Dan’s magpie tastes. The third floor they basically use for storage space, and they have a patio in the back that they never have time to enjoy and a small backyard that Dan pays the neighborhood association a fucking fortune to look after. They manipulated Gary into doing the interior decoration for free and it wasn’t even a disaster.

Of course it’s usually a mess like eighty percent of the time, and tonight is no different (the maid doesn’t come until Tuesday). Wineglasses from a few nights ago in the living room, next to a pile of Amy’s briefing books; Cassidy’s little art table in the dining-room-that’s-basically-an-office is covered with sticky watercolors; the usual array of toys and computer cords and shoes and books…

Nobody’s really hungry. Cassidy installs herself in front of the television with a blanket and her favorite stuffed animal (a giant lobster her grandparents brought her from Maine, and christened, to Amy’s horror, Richard). Amy sits at the kitchen island and starts ranting about Sophie while Dan wanders around looking for something to reheat for both of them. Normally Amy-rants are, like, his favorite thing—mostly because of the way she looks, bright-eyed and flushed and radiating rage, her chest heaving—but tonight, he feels like it’s a rote performance more than anything else.

“And of course, Sophie put it on Facebook before we had called everyone, so like, half of my second-cousins were already mad at us because they didn’t find out, like, the second it happened—“

Dan pushes some reheated Indian leftovers across the countertop. “Eat this.”

Amy doesn’t touch it. “And that’s another thing,” she says, “Do not fucking leak this, Dan, do not try and use this—“

“I’m not going to leak anything,” he says, irritated. “nobody fucking cares about your dad, Amy.”

It comes out way harsher than he intended. “ _Wow,”_ Amy hisses at him without missing a beat, looking infuriated.

“I mean, the American _public_ doesn’t care, it’s not going to make a Senator vote either way—“

“I don’t want you using this in one-on-one negotiations—I don’t want anyone to know—“

“What makes you think _I’m_ going to use it—“

Amy looks at him like she already knows what happeend at the Kasinski meeting, that Dan spun the news to their political advantage. “ _Spare_ me, Dan, you'd use my fucking menstrual cycle if you thought it would help you score a political win—“

“They’re going to find out anyway, like, other people on the Hill, Amy, you don’t work in a fucking vacuum. Kasinski’s chief of staff already knew about it, so before you get all on _my_ fucking case about leaking, you better get your own damn office in order—“

Amy’s eyes go all wide, and she actually gasps in horror. It’d be funny if he were in a better mood. “Oh my god, were you planning on telling me that at any point?!” She immediately grabs for her phone. “What the _fuck_ , Dan, why didn’t you tell me the minute you got back from the meeting?! Did you somehow break your brain on the drive?!” 

“Sorry, _babe_ , I got a little distracted when I walked in and found your long-lost high-school paramour trying to proposition you right in front of me—“

“Jesus Christ,” Amy mutters, already tapping out an email to Liz. “ _Get_ over yourself."  
  
“I don’t see what the fucking big deal is, people are going to find out, you might as well try and get something out of it—“

Cassidy wanders in, blanket trailing, clutching a book and her stuffed lobster. “Mommy,” she whines, “can you read to me?”

Amy holds out a hand to her automatically, but doesn’t stop her tirade. “Do not fucking mess me around on this, Dan, you have _no_ say here. I don’t even want Liz coming to the funeral.”

“Uh, okay.” Dan snorts in derision. “She’s going to want to come.”

“That’s too damn bad. It would be too much of a distraction with the vote coming up. And I don’t want my fucking father’s funeral to become part of some bullshit D.C. gossip narrative—”

“Mommy—“ Cassidy interrupts, louder and more demanding, her brow furrowing in anger. She’s clearly about sixty seconds away from a meltdown, if no one responds to her, but Dan’s too distracted by Amy and her crazy irrational objection to politicizing her own father's funeral to really register it.

“What’s with this insistence on no work people? Am _I_ allowed to go?”

“Not if you’re fucking going to _use_ it—“

“Mommy, _I want a story—_ “ Cassidy’s voice is all high-pitched and angry now. She tugs on Amy’s hand, hard.

“ _No,_ Cassie,” Amy snaps, finally turning to her. “I cannot read to you right this second, can’t you see your father and I are having a conversation?!”

Cassidy bursts into furious tears, throws Richard and the book to the ground, and runs for the stairs. A few seconds later, there’s the sound of a slamming door, and loud, dramatic sobs start echoing dimly from the second floor.

Dan runs a hand through his hair in frustration. “Nice one, _Mommy._ ” he mutters, before he can stop himself.

Amy glares. “Don’t fucking start. She got that from _you_.”

But then she slumps over and buries her face in her hands, and she looks so exhausted and defeated that Dan actually feels a twinge of guilt. “She’s just tired.” he says, as a peace-offering. “We’re all tired, okay?”

“I’ll go up and fix it.” Amy mumbles into her arms.

“You don’t have to fix anything right now.” Dan advises. “Let her cool off and take fifteen goddamn minutes and eat something. You want a drink?”

“No.”

Dan makes her one anyway (he figures they both could use some alcohol after the past forty eight hours). He comes over to sit by her, bumping his knee against her leg as he slides her the glass, and in response, Amy sighs and leans her head against his arm, sliding an ankle over his. Cassidy’s meltdown, for whatever reason, has cooled off their own bickering. Probably because it reminded both of them how fucking tired they are, too tired to really get into it anymore tonight.

In the end, Amy actually eats most of what Dan puts in front of her, and takes a few sips of her drink while he tells her all about his afternoon torturing Jonah through the Internet. Everyone once in a while they hear a thump or some more forced crying coming up from upstairs—Cassie throwing herself around her bedroom in a rage, most likely, trying to get their attention. God, their kid can be so fucking melodramatic sometimes (and he doesn’t care what Amy says, she didn’t get it all from _him_ either).

Eventually Amy heads upstairs to soothe Cassidy and get her ready for bed, and Dan leaves them to it for awhile. There’s probably some kind of mother-daughter bonding they need to have in the light of Amy’s dad dying. Dan hopes Cassidy is still young enough that she won’t have too many fucking questions about death or whatever. Jesus. No wonder his parents didn’t tell him shit when he was a kid. 

As he passes by Cassidy’s bedroom on the way to his and Amy’s, he can hear her voice from behind the door, soft and rhythmic as she reads aloud from some book, interspersed with Cassidy’s sleepy commentary.

He gets ready for bed, slowly, going through the motions without really thinking. The house gets darker and quieter around him, and Amy still hasn’t come to bed.

After a while, he goes back down the hall and very slowly opens the door to Cassie's bedroom.

Amy and Cassidy are curled up in her little bed, both of them fast asleep. A book is lying face-down on the floor, where it must have fallen from Amy’s hand. Their profiles look more similar in the dim light: the same nose, the same mouth. Something seems to heat up inside his chest, as he watches them, something seems to loosen, like it’s just a bit easier to breathe.

Dan turns out the lamp, picks up the book, but instead of leaving, he sits in the old overstuffed armchair at the other end of the room. He feels like a fucking creep doing it, but he can’t bring himself to leave—too much has happened in the past twenty four hours to let them lie here, vulnerable and alone in the dark. For some reason, all he can think about is when Cassie was an infant, and Amy would obsessively check on her five times a night out of an irrational fear that something might have happened. He made fun of her for it, obviously, but he was doing it too.

He yawns and puts his feet up on the ottoman. He’ll just stay for a bit…Amy will wake up soon, anyway.

But he wakes much later than he thought, to a flutter of movement in the darkness, a muted flash behind his eyelids. The night light has turned on automatically, casting the room in an oily yellow glow. He’s on his feet and standing over the bed, before he’s realized that Cassie is fine, there’s nothing wrong with her. But the bedroom door is ajar again.   
  
Out on the landing, Amy is crying.   
  
She’s nothing but a blurred outline, slumped at the top of the stairs, but he can hear her, full-throated weeping she’s trying to suppress. He’s never heard her cry like this—like she’s being torn in two, like she’s being ripped apart, something hopeless and desolate roiling within her. His mind barely computes what it means to see her like this, defeated in a way she never has been before. This is when he grasps it fully, maybe—that the very ground beneath their feet has changed, because her dad is dead.

She hasn’t noticed him—he could turn away, and she’d never know he was there. They deal with Cassie every day, they manage overwrought, narcissistic politicians and their bottomless need for affirmation, they've run entire political campaigns around the emotional manipulation of the American electorate…but normally, they do each other the courtesy of dealing with their own shit on their own.

He doesn’t even hesitate.

“Shit,” he mutters, sinking to his knees on the hardwood floor, reaching for her on pure instinct. “Shit, Amy, babe…”

It’s so dark he can't really see her, just the line of her hair and shoulders limned in the moonlight, but the minute his hands collide with her shoulders she falls back against his chest. She feels so fucking small.

“Hey, I’ve got you.” he murmurs into her hair, wrapping his arms around her fully.

Amy lets out this choked little gasping sob that twists something deep and primal inside him, not unlike the time Cassidy put her hand on the hot stove and got burn blisters all over her fingers and cried for him to make it better.

“I’m sorry—“ she hisses, her voice thick and wet. “It’s—”

“Oh my god, Amy, shut up, shut _the fuck_ up, it’s fine, you’re _fine_.” 

Finally, she goes fully limp against him, fisting a hand into his t-shirt and sobbing harder and getting snot and make-up and god knows what else all over him. He just keeps holding her. There’s nothing else for him to do.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Star Wars references obviously do not belong to me. All comments and kudos are deeply appreciated.


	6. Interlude (Chapter Five)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a *massively long* chapter written from Amy’s perspective. It's significantly more emotionally intense and engages directly with the idea of losing a parent. 
> 
> Like everyone on here, I'm very excited (and nervous!) for season seven. I have no idea how it will affect my writing process to write and be watching a final season at the same time. I’m crossing my fingers that whatever ending the show goes with for Dan and Amy, it won’t totally destroy my inspiration. Either I will need this fic for therapy or perhaps we’ll get lucky and this won’t seem so far outside the realm of possibility.

* * *

_Motherhood was very sweet…but very terrible. -_ L.M. Montgomery

* * *

 The alarm jolts her out of sleep, much earlier than she would like.

 _What the fuck?_ And then: _what the fuck am I sleeping on?_

Whatever it is, it’s shifting and tilting beneath her cheek, and then there’s a low vibration that rumbles through her whole head, causing the dull ache behind her eyes to magnify. Dan’s voice, sounding as though it’s far away, muttering curse words at his phone. The sound bores into her brain like a drill.

 _What’s happened?_ Amy thinks, fuzzily. Something’s happened. 

She remembers. 

The knowledge breaks over her again, like a slow-motion wave. For the rest of her fucking life, she’ll have to wake up and remember again.

The previous night starts to flicker back into focus. She was putting Cassie to bed…and she fell asleep while reading to her. And then she had awoken, in the dark, Cassie pressed against her chest, to see Dan asleep in the armchair across the room. Dan, who corralled Sophie’s kids and covered her last-minute Saturday meeting and willingly returned to her mother’s house to fetch her when he could have stayed in D.C. 

She had assumed he would have left her to fend for herself. If their positions were switched, she absolutely would have bailed on him. She thinks.

(Her dad is dead. Her _dad._ With every fucking heartbeat, the loss slams through her again.)

She buries her face in Dan’s shirt, which is sticky and still damp from her tears and snot and drool probably, from where he was holding her against him last night while she cried. She has a blurry memory of him half-carrying, half-supporting her back to their bed at one point, where she cried herself to sleep.

He held her for a long time. She has no idea if he slept at all.

“Oh shit,” she feels, more than hears, him groan.

“What?” she mumbles, refusing to look up. Her head feels like it weighs a thousand fucking pounds. 

“I’ve got CNN this morning.” he mutters, hoarsely. He’s still got an arm wrapped around her shoulders, his fingers knotted loosely through her hair. “Fuck, I totally forgot.”

Oh _fuck._ The realization manages to penetrate her numb brain, and she actually lifts her head. “Oh shit,” she echoes. They had specifically gotten Dan on CNN’s Sunday morning show—well, Greg had asked and they had jumped at the offer—as part of their final media blitz on healthcare.

Dan looks at her over the top of his phone. He doesn’t look so hot—there are shadows under his eyes and his skin looks slightly puffy and pale. The light streaming through the bedroom window throws every line on his face into relief, catching the grey in his hair. Amy’s sure she looks worse, but she still feels that little surge of smug glee that she has whenever Dan looks like shit (it’s good for his ego). It’s aburdly reassuring, that little surge.

“Do you want me to cancel?” he asks her. His fingers move through her hair, slow and firm against her skin, and the pressure makes her headache recede for an instant. 

For a moment, she’s so tempted to say yes. Their bed is so big and soft. Dan is so warm. They could roll over and go back to sleep for a few more hours (or at least until Cassidy woke up and started demanding food and attention). She could take a long bath, maybe.

And he could…distract her, later, if she felt up to it. 

But that expression he’s wearing right now, though…like he’s genuinely concerned…

“What? No, fuck no, you have to go.” she hears herself say, and if she doesn’t sound like everything is normal, she at least doesn’t sound like she’s about to start crying again. “We need someone semi-competent on television this morning, after all.” 

She expects a snarky response, maybe, like how he is plenty fucking competent at many things, _Ames,_ and she’s got ample proof of that, and if she gets in the shower with him he could remind her…

“Fine,” he says instead, without any pushback, and then taps her hips lightly with his fingers. “Then…move.” 

“Oh.” she croaks stupidly in response. 

She slides off his chest and presses her face into the cool pillows on “her” side of the bed. Dan runs a hand over her back as he pushes himself up, and she hears him grumbling to himself about not having picked out a suit yet, hears the soft rustle as he sheds clothes on the way into the bathroom. 

When the shower starts to run, she crawls over to the edge of the bed to try and catch a glimpse of herself in the mirror on her vanity table.

She looks absolutely fucking horrifying _,_ like some kind of nocturnal creature who lives in a hole and never sees the light of day. She’s deathly pale, her eyes are completely swollen from crying and her hair is all matted and there are weird lines on her face from where her cheek was pressed into Dan’s shirt all night. Her clothes from yesterday are wrinkled and twisted. She’s still wearing a bra—she was crying so hard she didn’t even take off her fucking _bra_ before falling asleep. Jesus. Who the _fuck_ ever said that crying made you feel better, she feels like shit scraped over the bottom end of a toilet plunger.

Everything feels wobbly, like she’s hungover. Her phone is downstairs, and she can’t even work up the urge to go find it. She checks the screen of Dan’s phone instead, to see if Liz has sent any urgent emails. She contemplates turning on the TV, and it seems like too much work, like the very sound of it would hurt her head. 

Dan emerges from the bathroom, naked and toweling himself off, smelling like fifteen different kinds of expensive skin and hair products. He catches her eye as he wanders over into the walk-in closet, and he doesn’t preen or smirk or make some comment about how badly she wants him.

Fuck. What she needs is for Dan to complain about how she ruined his shirt by crying all over it, not looking at her like she’s about to dissolve again. She fists her hands in her hair, which is probably making the rattiness and the knots even worse. It’s getting long again, almost past her shoulders. Her dad always liked it longer. 

Dan comes back out of the closet, mostly dressed, and he casts another glance at her as he tosses his suit jacket on the chair in the corner, that same careful, surveying look. Amy gets a strange contraction of panic in her stomach. 

“You need a tie,” she tells him, hoarsely, fighting hard for some sense of normalcy. “It’s health-care for veterans. You have to look serious.” 

“For fuck’s sake,” he mutters, and goes back into the closet. He comes back with two ties, and Amy watches him compare them in the mirror. 

“Do you…should I come with you?” she asks, more tentatively, as he tosses aside the spring green tie in favor of the slate blue one. Usually if he’s going on tv for a Liz-related appearance she comes along for the taping (usually, they’re on top of their schedules enough to figure out what do with Cassidy this early on a Sunday morning). She’s not really sure why she’s asking—she clearly isn’t getting ready with him—but she feels like…she needs to give him one more chance to act fucking _normal._ She cried in front of him. She wasn’t abducted by aliens.

“No, stay here.” he replies, through a yawn. “Make it look like it doesn’t matter how it goes.” 

She waits for him to say that she also looks terrible and it will let Greg know something is up and he’s going to think it’s bill-related, not personal, but he doesn’t. Instead, he just adds, a bit awkwardly, “And we’ve got Cassie.” 

And that’s how she _really_ knows he thinks she should stay at home, because he’s never given a fuck before about Cassie being on a television set, he’s been bringing her to the CNN studio since before she could fucking _walk._ Jesus, she must have completely fucking unnerved him last night. 

Amy stews over this while she watches Dan gets ready. He brings up coffee and her phone, spends approximately half an hour on his hair, runs up and down the stairs a few times tossing random shit into his bag. When he’s finally tousled and re-tousled his hair for the final time, he comes over to where she’s perched at the edge of the bed.

“Hey…” he murmurs, leaning over to place his hands on either side of her hips, bracketing her with his arms. He’s practically gleaming, still fresh from the shower, and she can feel the residual heat radiating off him, and even though she’s sort of vaguely pissed at him, she still wants to bury her face in his neck and just breathe him in forever. For one second she _badly_ wants to tell him to call it off, to stay here in bed with her. But it’s definitely too late now, Greg would never forgive him. “I’ll come back right after, I’ll make breakfast or something.”

That _tone_ in his voice…she _has_ to say something to show that she’s still fucking functional, for Christ’s sake. “Okay,” she replies, quietly, reaching out and tugging gently on his tie. “Dan—“ she begins.

He kisses her quickly, cutting her off, as to though to reassure her that she doesn’t have to say anything. “Get some sleep, okay?”

She shakes her head at him.“No, I was going to say—don’t forget to talk the tax breaks for families with incomes under $65000.”

Watching Dan’s face contort from an expression of overly-solicitous concern into one of cross disbelief is actually comical. Suddenly, incredibly, her mood lifts, and she’s surprised to find herself actually smiling. (Her face feels stiff…it’s quite possibly the first time she’s actually really smiled since Friday morning).

“Are you _s_ _hitting_ me?” he demands. “Yes, I fucking know what’s in this bill, Amy.”

“I have to check!” she insists, pushing back on his shoulders.

“Oh, _okay.”_ he retorts. “You want to make me some fucking cue cards while you’re at it?”

“Way below my pay grade, Egan.”

“Jesus fucking Chri— _bye.”_

But at the bedroom door he flashes her a little grin over his shoulder, warm and teasing and cocksure, like no matter how hard she busts his balls, he knows that she’s still watching him leave and savoring the view. Fuckface. She rolls her eyes at him and then he’s gone, bag swinging behind him as he dashes out onto the landing. A few seconds later, she hears the front door open and close (he must have remembered Cassidy is still sleeping, she thinks, otherwise he’d have slammed it.)

The moment of levity doesn’t last long however, as the early morning silence settles heavily back over the house. Amy collapses back against the pillows and stares up at the ceiling fan, feeling the exhaustion seep back into her bones, and sensing, with even more distaste, the return of all the fucking emotion she’d managed to keep at bay since she’d watched the emergency surgeon walking toward them in the hospital. 

He had such a set, professionally sympathetic face that Amy had known instantly what had happened. She had barely heard him speak, her ears were already full with the thud of her own heartbeat. Her mother had gripped her hands then, but Amy could barely feel them, she had gone so numb all over. It hadn’t gone away—she spent the last two days walking around in a weird bubble, processing everything through some thick emotional filter. 

Until last night, when that bubble popped. Last night. Last night she had stopped feeling so numb and every other fucking thing that there was to feel had come rushing in, so fast it was almost a physical sensation. Like realizing too late that she’d been shot or stabbed through the heart, like something had ripped her straight through the middle, leaving nothing but pieces behind. She couldn’t keep the fucking _horror_ of it all back any longer. 

And yet…she doesn’t feel better.

She cried for fucking hours, she cried so many damn tears she’s surprised the entire bed isn’t soaked through, she cried herself to sleep and gave herself the most horrible headache, she let her fucking hands-off emotionally stunted husband see her as vulnerable as she’s ever been except for maybe childbirth, and even for that she made Dan stand by her head the entire time. 

And she doesn’t feel any better.

She _should_ feel better. Crying was supposed to be a release. That’s what her mother had said, in one of her more lucid moments yesterday. “Honey,” she had murmured, “it’s okay to cry, it’s natural.” But Amy had ignored her and started talking about something else because she had thought there were no tears in her, still safe inside that bubble. Besides, Sophie had already cried enough for both of them. 

Well, she had been wrong. She cried her fucking guts out, she allowed _Dan_ to see her do it, and nothing has gotten better. Nothing has fucking changed. Her father is _still_ dead. She’ll never get to see him or talk to him ever again, and now there’s this giant fucking _hole_ inside of her and now she doesn’t even have the fucking small mercy of being too _numb_ to feel it.

And it’s always hard to not feel things around Dan and Cassie—Cassie because, well, Amy fucking _made_ her, and Dan, because… _Dan_ , because something about seeing him asleep in that stupid armchair, in his daughter’s bedroom, just like her dad used to wait in her room if she had a bad dream or even simply because she just wanted him there…it had broken something loose inside her.

But she’s not a fucking _little girl_ anymore. Wallowing like this…it’s not going to fix anything, and Dan’s already acting differently around her, and she can’t have that, she needs Dan to be _normal._

She and Dan don’t do concerned. They don’t do sensitive and caring and checking-in and all that fucking emotional labor that they talk about in those dumbass marriage books her mother insists on giving her every few months. Dan got her a ring. He didn’t get a fucking personality transplant along with it.

(And anyway, it wasn’t exactly his emotional intelligence that had convinced her a real relationship might actually work between them. There were a thousand reasons she had never been able to resist Dan Egan, a thousand reasons she had always found it easier to fucking _breathe_ when he was near her…but his understanding of basic human emotion wasn’t one of them. She always _liked_ that he never babied her, never patronized her, never told her she _needed_ to be feeling or not feeling some kind of way about anything.)

It comes to her, suddenly—when her dad had that maybe-stroke, when they were in Selina’s veep office—fuck, ten years ago?—and Dan had gone to the hospital with her that one time, so they could escape Furlong’s warpath through the OEOB.

_I’m not really great with illness or death or basic empathy, but I just want to say that I’m sorry about your dad and I think you’re being really brave…_

She had given him shit about it then—her dad was fine, after all—and she’d never had much of a reason to look back over that day, but now she can conjure the memory instantly and vividly. Charging through the hospital with Dan at her heels (a much younger Dan, clean-shaven, all black eyes and black hair and those stupid skinny ties he used to wear)….That flash of a genuine person underneath all that smug, arrogant bravado that normally made her want to kick him in the teeth. He had been _so_ uncomfortable, it was almost endearing, it made her hate him less (and she _really_ hated Dan back then. 

And it had been all she needed. He had gone back to normal after those few hours in the hospital, back to plotting and teasing her and making it so that she wasn’t quite on her own in dealing with Selina’s nonsense—God knows Selina never asked about her dad—and those few hours had been enough, from him, it had been _more_ than enough.

What she _really_ wants, Amy thinks bitterly, is for everything to go back to fucking normal. But she can’t have that, because her dad is dead and Dan is sufficiently freaked out by it that he’s treating her _nicely_ and, oh yeah, they have a _child_ in the middle of all this who they have to try and not fuck up too badly ( _well, no more than we have already_ , Dan’s voice snarks in her head).

She can’t think about it too hard, and or she’ll start fucking crying again. And crying clearly solves nothing. So instead, with a groan, she rolls over, pulls the covers up over head, and waits for Dan to get back from CNN.

 

* * *

 

She’s just dozed off when her phone starts vibrating. She answers automatically, in case it’s Dan or Liz or her mother or—oh, who the fuck is she kidding, Amy hasn’t left her phone unanswered since 2009.

“…’lo?”

“You have to come back out here.” Sophie’s nasal voice cuts through her ears like a dull saw. 

Oh, shit.

“Sophie…” she groans. “Are you fucking kidding me? We were just there, Mom said we could leave, she was fine…”

There’s a brief pause on the other end of the line, then: “You sound weird. What’s wrong with you?”

“…of course I sound fucking weird, I—forget it, what’s happening?”

“Dad’s sisters are driving in from Pennsylvania.” Sophie reports. 

Jesus Christ. Her dad has three sisters—all of them tall, blonde, fertile, and impossibly nosy and chatty, and they all live within ten blocks of each other across the Maryland border. She suddenly wishes Dan had brought up some whiskey with her coffee. Then, with a dull thud, she remembers that her car is still parked in her designated spot at work, on the other side of the city.

“… _Now_? It’s…barely seven thirty.”

“Well, they’re all old and wake up at five am anyway, _Amy,_ so take a Xanax and get it the fuck together and get back out here, it’s not like it’s far. They’ll want to see you too, you know, because you’re the fucking _successful_ one.”

Was she? By their standards, Amy’s pretty positive she’s a failure on all fucking accounts. She still hasn’t learned to really cook, she has her own fucking career, and she only has one kid. Even Sophie managed to push out three. 

“And bring Dan too. They’re definitely going to want to see Dan.”

Legally shackled for life to a minor television personality…that probably counted for something. 

“Dan’s at work.” And thank fuck for that. There’s no way in _hell_ she can deal with introducing Dan to any extended family members today. Not that he’d even agree to go in the first place. (Then again…it’s not like he’s never had a problem allowing older women to fawn over him.) “They’ll have to settle for Cassidy.” 

“It’s Sunday, what the fuck is he doing?” 

Amy doesn’t want to say. She has a very bad feeling it’s going to lead to nothing good, but her head hurts too much to think of a good lie. “…He’s got CNN.” 

“Oooh… _fun._ ” Sophie sounds perversely delighted. “I’ll tell Mom to DVR it. They will _love_ that he’s on TV this morning, I’m sure they’ll want to ask you _all_ kinds of questions about _Danny_ Egan.”

“Oh my fucking god,” Amy growls bleakly into her pillow. She didn’t know it was possible to feel worse than she already does, and yet here she is, Sophie living down to her expectations, as per fucking usual. 

“What?”

“Nothing. Tell Mom I’ll get there when I get there.”

“And, you know, maybe do something different with your hair and makeup, so it’s not, like, a total mystery why you two are still toget—“

Amy hangs up on her. 

She feels a little more like a human after she takes a shower and swallows down the most powerful headache medication she can find in the medicine cabinet. It takes her a few tries to undo the child-proof cap, and she’s so wrung out this almost reduces her to furious tears again. She’s far too used to Dan coming up behind her and doing stupid, small things like screwing the tops off of jars and reaching over her head for out-of-reach objects in the kitchen. He does without even thinking half of the time, and she’s stopped noticing. 

As usual, Dan’s left a trail of evidence all over the bathroom and the bedroom, because he’s a sixteen year old teenage boy stuck in the body in a forty-five year old man—the cap off the toothpaste, his towel still on the floor of the walk-in closet, where she trips over it and almost faceplants into the shoe shelves. Fuck. She needs caffeine, and she needs to eat…something, even if the thought of food makes her stomach turn over.

She surveys her wardrobe critically. She’ll need some fucking armor to get through today, but she can’t exactly wear a power suit and she can’t wear anything too bright, out of “respect.” Her dad wouldn’t give a shit about those kinds of rules, but her aunts will, and as much as she hates to admit it, Sophie’s right. Amy would rather  _not_ be grilled about Dan while wearing jeans and her old Penn sweatshirt while he’s on TV in a fucking Prada suit flashing his stupid overly-whitened teeth for every woman in America. 

Eventually she selects a grey and cream-colored cotton dress, with a belted waist and skirt that flares out over her hips. It makes her look like a WASPy housewife, which is exactly why her family will love it and why it’s still hanging at the back of the closet with the tags on. She takes time with her hair, curling it, and applies heavier-than-usual foundation and eye make-up (she’s got to get rid of the fucking giant circles under her eyes if she wants to be seen in public today). When she’s finally finished—looking more like a normal person, even if she doesn’t _feel_ normal—she pulls on a cardigan (as protection for the dress) and goes to wake up Cassidy.

Down the hall, Cassie’s all sprawled out in her bed, exactly where Dan and Amy left her last night. She sleeps on her side, one arm flung out and one other hand tucked up under her cheek, her black hair falling over her face, flushed in sleep. Amy, for the billionth time, probably, reflects on how…not like a Brookheimer her daughter looks. Except for the eyes, Cassie got Dan’s hair and his chin and his eyebrows and his fucking mascara-model eyelashes, and she’s even got a delicate scattering of Dan’s freckles right across her nose, so perfectly arranged it’s as if they were personally painted on there. And if Dan could have, he absolutely would have.

Amy had known, with a fatalist sense of doom, from the very first moment she decided to keep her and Dan’s accident-baby, that the baby was going _love_ Dan. No matter what he decided to do, if he only ever showed up for birthdays and Christmas, if he only ever appeared when he needed to wheedle Amy for some political favor, she knew the baby was going to fucking adore him. How could she avoid it? Dan was handsome and charismatic and funny and very good at getting what he wanted from people who didn’t know him very well and he wasn’t half as awkward around other people’s kids as she was (at least when he needed something from their parents). His own child had no fucking chance of resisting him, at least until it grew up and realized that Dan-the-dad was only interested in manipulating him or her for professional gain. Back when she was pregnant, and she and Dan were barely speaking and fighting when they did speak to each other, she had intended to keep the baby far away from him for that very reason, to minimize the emotional carnage. 

But it hadn’t worked out that way, exactly. 

Dan was still an egotistical, Machiavellian, materialistic, perpetually smug dickhead, overly attuned to the professional benefits of fatherhood, but now he was an egotistical, Machiavellian, materialistic, perpetually smug dickhead with a daughter he’d fucking move heaven and earth for, even if he'd never admit it. Everyone, all the time, comments on how alike they are, and Dan revels in it, makes no secret of how much pride he takes in having this perfect little precocious daughter who not only adores him, but resembles him so strongly. 

As for Amy…well, it’s not that she feels left out, but they’re such a fucking matched set...

She sits down at the edge of the bed and rubs a hand gently over Cassie’s back to wake her. Immediately, her daughter is awake, scrambling into a sitting position, and Amy actually jumps.

“Mommy,” Cassidy whimpers. She looks distressed, almost feverish. 

“Cassie, what’s wrong?” Immediately there’s nothing in her head, no Dan, no death, just the thumping impulse to figure out what’s making her child unhappy, and to destroy it with her bare hands.

(She had worried about that too, about being a shitty mother…but as it turned out, there was absolutely _nothing_  the fuck wrong with her maternal instincts after all, turns out she’d crawl across cut glass without a second thought, she’d carve out her own heart with no questions asked, to protect her daughter. Dan liked to style himself as the enforcer of the family…but he has no fucking clue what motherhood is like, he has _no_ idea what Amy would do if she had to.)

“I had a bad dream.” Cassie crawls into Amy’s lap without hesitation, and Amy remembers again, as her daughter clings to her, she wonders how she can ever fucking doubt—this is her baby _._ Even Dan isn’t a part of what happens here, when it’s just the two of them and Cassidy reaches out for her and only her.

“Oh, I’m sorry…do you want to tell me what it was about?”

Cassie shakes her head fiercely and buries her face in Amy’s cardigan. They sit there on the bed for a little while, Amy cradling her daughter against her, almost like she did when she was much smaller. She shuts her eyes and presses her lips to the top of Cassidy’s head, which smells like the over-priced all-natural lavender-chamomile shampoo that Dan insists on buying from this bougie-as-fuck boutique in Georgetown. For just this moment, in the pale sunlight, that hole left by her father’s death fills up and over, the ragged edges smoothed out by the quick, regular thumps of Cassie’s heartbeat. 

After a while she tilts her head so she can look into Cassidy’s face and asks, in a conspiratorial whisper, “Hey, do you want to go see Daddy at work?”

Cassie’s eyes fly open again, this time in excitement. “Oh, yes!” she exclaims.

“Okay, if you get ready _really_ quickly, we’ll have time to go see him before we go to Grandma’s.” This isn’t strictly true—okay, it’s a total lie, but her car is a few blocks from the CNN studio, so they might as well stop by there so she can see how his segment is going, and it’s not like she’s above lying to her daughter to make her move faster. 

Cassie’s already darting for her dresser, but then she stops. “But…we were just at Grandma’s.”

“I know, but we have to go back. Grandma wants to see you, and…” she trails off, awkwardly. Shit. She hadn’t even considered the emotional ramifications of dragging Cassidy in and out of the house she must absolutely associate with her grandfather.  “…Is that okay?”

Cassidy looks like she's thinking it over. "Do I have to talk to Aunt Sophie?"

"You never have to talk to Aunt Sophie." 

"Then we can go." Cassidy decrees.

 

* * *

 

Amy’s not very good at switching off the work part of her brain—her entire brain, basically—and giving herself over the mundanities of parenting. Dan’s usually a lot better, or he seems better, anyway, at doing all that shit on auto-pilot, the dressing, the feeding, the cleaning... It’s definitely because he’s a man and has been socialized to care less about how much emotional investment he puts into decisions like what to make for breakfast or what Cassidy should wear to school. 

But this morning, it’s a fucking _relief_ to not think about anything real for the hour before they have to leave. Cassie gets dressed with minimal fuss, and there’s only a minor tussle over whether or not she gets to bring Richard-the-lobster with her. (Amy fucking _hates_ that lobster, she absolutely rues the day that Dan’s parents bought her that giant, oddly-shaped, impractical stuffed crustacean—Dan’s mother thought it was _cute,_ for fuck’s sake. It’s literally too big to fit into a backpack or a purse or even a damn suitcase, and basically there’s no way she’s ever letting Cassidy bring it into the CNN studio.) She gets some cereal into both of them, pours some coffee into a travel mug, and lets Cassie call the Uber on her phone while she runs around the first floor of the house gathering up whatever she might need for yet another interminable day at her mother’s.

Already, she can feel the twinges of guilt that she’s not immediately rushing out back out to Maryland—but she needs to get her car and now she’s awake and over her fucking…crying lapse enough that she wants to see how Dan’s tv segment goes, she hasn’t _completely_ lost her mind, she has an extremely crucial piece of legislation to turn into law, after all, and…and…Sophie can go suck some CVS dick. 

It’s almost nine thirty by the time they make it downtown. At the CNN building, security waves them through, recognizing Amy, and Cassie prances into the newsroom ahead of her like she fucking owns the place. One of the PA’s comes darting over, some fucking underling who accidentally calls Amy “Mrs. Egan”, and asks if she and her daughter would like to watch in the green room. Amy declines, icily; Cassidy’s already making a beeline for the soundstage, and she has to go make sure she doesn’t throw off the camera guys. One of them nods to Amy when she comes up and grabs Cassidy around the shoulders, to keep her in one place. 

They’re far enough back that Dan hasn’t noticed their arrival. The show is going well so far. The opposing guest for the health-care segment is some Marwood protégé who Dan is in the midst of shredding pretty thoroughly. Since Jonah’s still threatening (behind closed doors) to veto the bill, they can’t afford to show any weakness. 

Obscured behind the cameras, Amy allows herself to do something that she never does when Dan’s actually paying attention and just…enjoy watching him. He’s been fully leaning into the silver fox look recently, not fighting the grey in his hair and beard, and it’s _criminal_ how much it works for him. She watches the play of expressions across his face as he spars with his opponent, the familiar arch of his right eyebrow, the full lips that form his triumphant smirk when he makes a particularly good point, the strong line of his shoulders in that perfectly tailored suit…and low-level heat pools at the base of her stomach, making her fingertips tingle and the corners of her lips tilt up in a little secret smile. She’s never _not_ been attracted to Dan, although it’s usually been countered by an equally powerful desire to throttle him. But the way he looks now…maybe it’s her older sex hormones or something about what aging is doing to his cheekbones, she doesn’t fucking know, but sometimes she literally finds it unbearable to be around him, he’s so distractingly, upsettlingly handsome.

They reach the 9:40 news break, Marwood’s guy takes off for the bathroom to gather his dignity in private, and Cassidy immediately darts out onto the soundstage, tired of waiting.

“Daddy, surprise!” she calls, flying past Greg, who doesn’t even look up from his notes. 

Dan, to his credit, looks pretty damn surprised at the sudden appearance of his daughter, but it immediately gives way to a devastating smile that’s one-half for Cassidy’s benefit and one-half for the benefit of every single camera in the vicinity. It’s obviously not lost on him (or Amy, either) just how good he’s about to look in front of the entire CNN production team in the next four minutes.

“ _Hey_ , kiddo, look at you, you came all the way down here to see me?”

“It was Mommy’s idea.” Cassidy tells him magnanimously, and inadvertently outing Amy.

“Well, come up here and check out the view.” He picks her up and swings her over—so easily and lightly, like she weighs nothing—so that she’s perched on the desk that’s covered in their fake reference notes. Already grossly camera-aware for a five year old, Cassidy throws a triumphant smile back at the production team, the bright lights catching off her hair and her eyes. 

Suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, Amy finds it hard to breathe, something contracting in her chest, watching Dan and his daughter shine together onstage, their dark heads bent close together. Dan has a daughter, _Dan_ , the surreality of it has never worn off, and he’s far from perfect but he’s still fucking _here,_ committed and here, and Amy’s never going to have that again, her own father is dead, he’s never going to smile at her the way Dan is grinning at Cassidy now, like she’s perfect, like she’s safe…

“Ms. Brookheimer?” one of the sound guys is speaking to her, as though from far away. “Uh…are you all right?” Amy suddenly realizes she’s gripping the edge of a camera tripod like it’s a fucking life-raft. “ _Yes._ ” she growls at him, feeling disgusted with herself, and it’s gratifying to watch him back off, terrified. 

Out of the corner of her eye, she can see a crowd of female PA’s practically fluttering and cooing offstage, their phones raised, and if this fucking scene is going to make the rounds on Twitter, she’s going to be a goddamned fucking part of it. She shakes her hair back and marches out onto the stage, where Cassie is now showing Greg her fading butterfly tattoo. Dan’s face, gratifyingly, lights up when he sees her, and she doesn’t even think it’s mostly for everyone watching—get _that_ expression on camera, bitches, she thinks.

“I wondered where you were hiding.” he grins, and reaches out a hand to grab hers, pulling her up closer, to stand between his legs. 

“I have to go out to my mom’s again,” she tells him hastily, and Dan’s face falls slightly.

“Why do you have to go back out there?”

“My aunts—my dad’s sisters—are arriving this morning, and I just…I need to go back out to the house, to see them.” She’s too tired to get into all the family dynamics. 

“Jesus, you have family coming already? It’s not even been forty eight hours.”

“…their brother just died, Dan.” 

“Uh, I meant…it’s _really_ nice they’re so close with your mom.” he backtracks shamelessly, but Amy finds his completely callous reaction stupidly reassuring. 

“Anyway, I have to take Cassie with me, but my car is here, and I thought…we might as well meet you before we left.”

“What, I’m not coming?” he says, sounding genuinely surprised. 

“I’m sorry, did you _want_ to come?” 

He pulls a face of exaggerated outrage. “ _No,_ but it’s nice to be _asked_ , Ames.”  

“Well, you’re not.” she replies emphatically. “It’s just going to be a bunch of women, and if you’re there, you’ll just fucking…distract everyone.”

He smirks at her, his dark eyes warm and twinkling, and tugs on her hand again, so that she has to put her hands on his shoulders to steady herself. “But who’s going to distract _you_ , then?”

Amy is not exactly a fan of PDA (she's the opposite of a fan). It’s been hard enough, since she and Dan became a public item—since having his baby _,_ really—to not have her political identity completely subsumed into his, and she doesn’t need photos of them _looking_ like a couple in professional settings making the rounds anymore than they already do. (“It’s just _…very_ obvious that you’re fucking.” Liz had commented once, before she had brought on Dan permanently). It’s different for Dan because obviously Amy makes him look more sanitary and approachable, ten fucking times over. But it’s not like he’s super touchy-feely in public either, usually he's too busy bickering with her or complaining about something to try and cop a feel in public. And he doesn’t really give a shit how she acts around him as long she’ll do bullshit couple-y things with him outside of work whenever he decides he needs something new for his precious Instagram and Twitter accounts. 

This morning, though…her resistance is perilously low. She’s probably dehydrated after crying an ocean of tears in the last twenty four hours, or her blood sugar is off, or something….but her knees are practically going weak as Dan grins wider at her, a private, filthy smile, like maybe he wants to tell her to blow off her mother’s and come back to bed with him for a few hours. 

“Keep your head in the game.” she chides him softly, even as she’s wondering just how terrible it would be if a photo of Dan grabbing her ass on the CNN soundstage ended up on Twitter.

Dan scoffs at her. “Weren’t you watching? This kid is practically wetting himself on air, Marwood must really not give a shit to send him—“

She opens her mouth to respond, but then the news-break is wrapping up, and she has to hustle Cassie off stage for the last part of the segment. The Marwood surrogate comes back out on set looking like he just vomited up his breakfast, but he’s inconveniently spunkier for the last ten minutes of the show, which Greg has decided to devote to covering Jonah’s public silence on the bill.

“I just don’t see how you can talk about this reform bill as a done-deal when the president himself has displayed mixed signals about—“ he says, extra-snotty with thirty seconds left.

“The president knows what this bill will do for the hardworking families of this country—“ Danresponds sharply.

“Well, _”_ intones the Marwood flunkie, practically sticking his nose in the air on camera _,_ “…there’s still plenty of time for the president to put the country over party and continue to seek advice from _both_ sides of the aisle—“

Dan opens his mouth to retort, but _of fucking course_ Greg decides to wrap up the show then.

“And that’s all the time we have for today. Dan, Carlton, thank you for—“

“What the fuck is he doing?!” Amy demands furiously at the nearest camera operator. Immediately, her phone starts going off in her bag.

“Uh, ma'am, the segment’s over—“

“That’ll be the sound bite they’ll run with for the next twenty four hours—“ she hisses, resisting the urge to tear at her hair.

Marwood’s guy is already flouncing off the stage, looking pleased that he got the last word in, but also probably because he wants to escape Dan, who’s on his feet and looking as murderous as she feels. Their eyes meet briefly, and then he looks away to glare at Greg, who’s gathering up his fucking fake notes and practically _whistling_ in feigned innocence. Amy’s torn between running out on stage and strangling him herself, or letting Dan ream him out in front of the entire production staff. 

“What?” Cassie asks, confused at Amy’s feet. “What happened?”

“Mommy and Daddy got screwed.” Amy mutters darkly, and reaches for her vibrating phone.

 

* * *

 

The idea that Jonah, that fucking Mutant Pinocchio, might try and strike some kind of deal with the other side, is an extremely unwelcome possibility—they’ve been dominating with their media coverage recently, and they don’t need the bill’s opponents to start _organizing_ for some doomed political crusade that's going to suck up the air waves, for fuck’s sake. Of course, Jonah’s also so impossibly stupid that it’s equally likely he hasn’t had the idea at all, but after he watches CNN run that stupid clip thirty more times by the end of the day, he’ll fucking _think_ it was his idea. Liz is on the phone literally twenty five seconds after the show’s ended, to start strategizing about what they need to do to head off any potential defections. Dan gets sidelined by that flock of female PAs in search of selfies, and by the time he gets off the stage both Greg and Marwood’s surrogate have disappeared, and he’s spoiling for a fight.

In the end, they all decide that Dan just has to go threaten the minority leader in person (“check his mistress’s boudoir”, Liz quips dryly on the phone) and remind him of the fucking facts—that their bill is as popular a piece of American legislation since the Great fucking Society, and there’s no point trying to sabotage it just because their party is theoretically led by a deformed stick puppet who gets his strings pulled by someone new every day. Amy’s all prepared to go busting down doors with him, threatening to castrate anyone who fucks with their bill, but then Cassidy—who up until this moment has been lying upside down in a make-up chair, playing a word game on Amy’s iPad—reminds both of her parents that she and Amy were due at “Grandma’s” house.

 _Shit._ In the immediate chaos after Dan’s segment, while they were frantically figuring out what to do next, she had been able to forget, for a whole ten minutes, what had happened, to forget about missing her father and the existence of her crazy family and all the impossible things they needed from her…it’s so much more _bearable_ to just think about her job and her fantasies of sautéing Marwood’s scrotum for Sunday brunch.

For a second she contemplates not going, blowing the whole thing off and sticking with Dan, but she’s already got twenty-six text messages and four missed calls from her mother and Sophie wondering where she is, and she knows if she doesn’t go back today she’ll never hear the fucking end of it from them—and it’s no longer just _them_ she has to contend with, it’s her entire fucking extended family, a whole cabal of female relatives waiting to rain disapproval down over her head because of her career choices. And there’s no way she’s getting through the next two weeks or four weeks or six weeks—oh god, she has no clue how how long this is going to endure, weeks, maybe? a whole month?—by getting perpetually guilted for not being there when her father’s sisters first arrived on the scene.

“Besides,” Dan says, once they’re out on the sidewalk in front of the building. “We know that Jonah is _definitely_ going to do something worse before this is all over, and you should save pissing off your family until that special moment arrives." 

"Oh  _boy._ " Amy mutters, and Dan laughs. He tugs on her hair, kisses Cassidy on top of the head, and heads off toward his car without a backward glance, already wrapped up in whatever back-room deals he’s plotting to make sure that Jonah doesn’t fuck them over (today, at least).

“Okay,” Amy sighs, watching him. "Let's go to Grandma's."

"Why isn't Daddy coming?"

 _Trust me,_ Amy thinks.  _You don't want to see your dad in this kind of environment any more than you have to._

 _"_ He has to go fix something for work." 

"...so why aren't you fixing it too?"

Nothing like her own baby to pour salt in the wound. 

"I really want to, but I can't. Because Grandma's waiting for us." 

Cassidy is looking at her almost suspiciously, in a way that makes Amy suddenly afraid that she somehow saw or heard her crying her guts out last night. Shit. Sometimes it’s fucking unnerving seeing her own eyes gazing out of someone else’s face. 

"Cassidy, come _on._ " she repeats, briskly, stepping up the pace. "We're already late."

"Can I tell everyone at Grandma's house I was on TV with Daddy?"

"Yeah, sure you can, baby. That sounds like a story that will make Grandma  _very_ happy." Ugh. She fucking hates everything right now. 

 

* * *

 

Her mother’s house is excruciating, just one long fucking shrill scream of a day.

The minute she and Cassidy arrive, her aunts—Elizabeth, Susan, and Valerie—immediately start fussing over Cassidy like she’s some kind of long-lost orphan princess who Amy found in a gutter somewhere. They go on and on about how perfect she is, and how it’s just _such a shame_ that Dan couldn’t come along to meet them as well, but of course they do understand since he was on _television_ this morning, oh my goodness, it’s just so funny and unbelievable that little Amy ended up with _Danny Egan_ who they used to watch on CBS every Sunday! They’re practically cackling with glee, the fucking three witches of Macbeth, three elderly blondes in matching Talbots sweater-sets. They’re already force-feeding everyone and there are casseroles and pies all over the house. Amy wants to stab herself in the eyeballs.

Eventually Cassidy gets released to go play and then all the women have to sit around the dining room table and talk about funeral details. Her aunts have _lots_ of ideas for the service and and the wake and they spend a lot of time arguing with each other, and Amy is forced to referee because her mother is incapable of taking a side and Sophie doesn’t give a fuck really as long as no one asks her to do anything too important. They hardly make any progress.

Ninety percent of her brain is back in D.C., with Dan. She texts him constantly under the table, and Dan sends her cranky updates. The thought of Dan spending his Sunday afternoon threatening craven politicians with professional retribution if they step out of line fills her with a strange kind of furious jealousy. It would be such a fucking _relief_ compared to the agony of watching the minutes tick by in the same kitchen where her father used to make waffles on Sunday mornings.

Now that her safe bubble of protective numbness has popped, being in this house is _terrible._ She hasn’t got a fucking clue how her mother and Sophie are managing here, because barely as an hour has passed before she feels like she wants to crawl up the walls. Memories of her father are everywhere, she can practically _see_ him, his fucking _ghost_ appearing in every damn corner—dozing in his favorite armchair, puttering in the garage—and it’s like that jagged hole inside of her is being slowly and searingly ripped farther apart, seam by seam.

No one else seems to be as affected as Amy is. In fact, her aunts have unearthed from somewhere all these giant scrapbooks, to pore over for photos, and no one seems to have any qualms that it might be _too fucking soon_ to look at pictures of the family road-trip to Mount Rushmore.

At one point Amy’s mother does start crying a little, over photos of her husband and baby Amy and Sophie, and as everyone starts rushing around for tissues and tea, it allows Amy to escape upstairs and scream into a pillow for a whole thirty seconds.

It doesn’t make sense, and the irrationality of it only infuriates her further…but she wants Dan to treat her like everything’s fine and she simultaneously hates, _hates,_ hates having to pretend that everything is fine here.

It doesn’t help—or maybe it does—that Cassidy is extremely well-behaved the entire afternoon. Her daughter isn’t perfect by any fucking means—she’s too diabolical by a half, convinced she’s already the queen of the world, and she’s had plenty of public meltdowns that have been truly humiliating. But she’s also spent most of her life around busy adults, so when she _wants_ to, she can entertain herself. She plays quietly with Alyssa and lets her grandmother and newfound great aunts fuss over her without doing anything too mischievous like cursing or spilling juice on purpose or saying something rude. She even takes a nap later in the afternoon, even though she’s really too old for naps, as though she implicitly understood that Amy needed a break from checking on her.

She was always on her best behavior in this house, anyway. Her father and Cassie always got along _so_ well, and Amy knew that for him, it almost—almost—made up for the fact that she looked so much like Dan. It honestly makes her heart feel too fucking big. (And she hates herself that that’s the only way she describe it, Jesus, she’ll never make it through if she keeps getting whacked with these fucking waves of sentimentality, she’s not fucking Catherine Meyer.)

By the time she and Cassidy have to leave, Amy’s wound so tightly she can practically feel her joints splintering.

“Mommy?”

“Yeah, baby?”

They’re in the car, finally, _finally,_ on the way home. Cassidy’s in the back, sitting next to the pecan pie that Aunt Elizabeth insisted they bring home to _Danny_. It’s dark outside and silent inside.The thought of music or one of Cassidy’s insultingly moronic kid podcasts or basically the sound of any other human voice besides her daughter’s is unthinkable for Amy right now—she’s practically limp over the steering wheel, reveling in the quiet.

“Before Grandpa died, did you give him my picture?”

“What picture?”

“My cherry blossom picture from school.”

“ _Oh_ …” On Friday morning, she had asked Cassie for one of her pictures to bring to her dad at his appointment. Fuck, that seems like a hundred years ago and it was literally the day before yesterday. It’s definitely still in her bag, quite possibly ruined now. Good thing they've got like thirteen more versions of it at home on their refrigerator. “No, sweetie, I’m so sorry, I didn’t see him before….um, before.”

“Oh, okay.” Cassie replies, in a smaller voice, and goes back to looking out the window. The moonlight’s falling starkly over her face, so that she looks almost alien, with her thick inky hair all around her head and her huge eyes reflecting the moon. It’s so disconcerting that Amy hurries to say anything that will get her daughter to stop looking so other-worldly and…unfamilar to her.

“If you want, you can give your picture to Grandma. Or you can put it in with the coffin, during the service.”

“The…what?”

“Um…” Amy considers about how best to explain the concept of a funeral service to a five year old. “In a few weeks, we’re going to have a goodbye ceremony for your grandfather. And we can give him things for the…for the place he will be for that.” That was one of the many, many topics that had been up for discussion today, what exactly was going to go in her father’s coffin, if anything at all, keepsakes or letters or whatever the fuck—her aunts had pulled a bunch of sentimental, kitchsy ideas for funerals off of the internet, most of which Amy had vetoed on sheer principle, but her mother liked the coffin idea.

“We can still give him things?” Cassidy inquires.

“Yes. You can give him whatever you want. It’s a way for us to say goodbye.”

“But…will he be there?”

“Uh…no, Cass.” Shit, this is so not where she wanted the conversation to go. “No, he won’t. Not really. You won’t be able to see him.”

“Then how will he know I gave him something?” Cassidy’s starting to sound frustrated, like she suspects that this whole concept of saying goodbye to a dead person is quite possibly bullshit. After the last twenty four hours, Amy is fucking inclined to agree with her.

“…I think he’ll know.” But she doesn’t believe what she’s saying at all, and she fucking hates herself for it. She had always promised herself that she wasn’t going to be some parent who fed her kid sugary fake stories to protect them from reality, and here she is, promising her daughter that her dead grandfather will somehow know if she drops a shitty watercolor of a pink cherry tree into a coffin.

But luckily—or maybe not, Amy doesn’t fucking know anymore—Cassidy doesn’t seem particularly assuaged by her response.

“Mommy?”

“…yes?”

“You said that Grandpa died because he was sick.”

“Mmhmm.”

“Are you and Daddy sick too?”

“What?! Cassie, no _—_ oh, _shit—“_

As she says it, the Lexus in front of them suddenly slams on the brakes, so that Amy has to slam on hers. Cassidy shrieks hysterically in the back as they both lurch forward in their seats, and Amy relieves her feelings by leaning so hard on the horn the driver of the car that stopped—who looks like he’s fucking fifteen, for God’s sake—flips her off before zooming ahead of them.

“Goddamn fucking incompetent student driver—I’m going to get the the fucking _Secretary of Transportation_ on your delinquent weak-ass—“

“Oh look, Mommy, there's a raccoon.” Cassidy comments matter-of-factly, craning her head to look out the window. 

“Cassie,” Amy pants frantically, completely caught up in rage and panicked concern about her daughter’s mental health. “Why would you think we’re sick?”

She shrugs; she looks like she regrets saying anything at all, based on her mother’s clearly freaked reaction. “Grandpa was sick.”

For a minute, Amy contemplates pulling over and crawling into the backseat so she can talk to her daughter directly, for a thoughtful and realistic conversation about the complicated nature of aging and death. She’s also reasonably certain that if she does that, she will _completely_ fucking lose it and just grab onto Cassidy and cry so uncontrollaby that Dan will need to come find them at some country-club gas station in Chevy Chase. He’ll definitely never let her hear the end of it once everything goes back to normal.

“Your father and I are _not_ going anywhere.” Amy says firmly, trying to sound as definitive and reassuring as possible. Although it occurs to her—she hasn’t thought for _years_ about the legal arrangements they’d made in the case of the…unimaginable happening, she doesn’t even remember the details. The realization makes her feel more unstable than ever, so she frantically shoves it the back of her mind. _Later_.

“Daddy says he’s going to live forever.”

“Well _yeah_ , he probably thinks he will.” Amy mutters to herself. Fucking Dan, with his obsessive gym regime and his insolent vanity and his complete inability to think in the long-term. (Still, the thought of him right now, waiting at home for her and Cassie, fills her an almost unbearable warmth. She wants to find him and dig her fingers into his skin and maybe even bite him, to reassure herself that he’s still real.)

“But he’s not, right?”

“No one lives forever, baby. Not even your father. But I don’t want you to think about that, okay? It’s not…nothing has changed, okay? Nothing is going to happen.”

“Okay.” Cassidy replies, and she looks so trusting and everything about this conversations feels so raw and fragile that Amy wonders if Dan will have to come find them at that gas station anyway. The idea of another conversation like this one is panic-inducing.

“God, this whole thing is so fucking weird.” she comments, more to steady herself than for any other reason.

“Yeah,” her daughter agrees. “When is it going to stop being weird?”

 

* * *

 

“Hey, you’re back!” comes Dan’s voice the second that Amy and Cassidy tumble through the front door. Suddenly he's right there, filling up Amy’s vision. He’s wearing his favorite stupid designer sweatpants and a faded Rangers t-shirt and he looks so appealing that for a second, Amy just wants to collapse into his arms and fucking beg him take her away where she won’t have to talk to anyone ever again.

“…were you waiting for us?” she asks him instead, because giving him shit will always, _always_ be safer than anything else. 

“What? _No._ ” he scoffs emphatically, even as he hoists Cassidy into the air. “Is that a pie?”

Before he can say anything else, Amy cuts him off, dropping her bag and coat to the floor and dumping the pie tin on the side table. “We didn’t lose anyone, did we?”

“Since you texted me less than two hours ago? We’re _fine._ ” he says. “Furlong got back from China anyway, and he’ll get Jonah back on the leash.”

“Well…fan-fucking-tastic.” Amy mutters. “Until tomorrow, anyway.”

Cassidy giggles. “ _Fuck_ -ing Furlong,” she says in a sing-song voice, tilting her head, as thoughshe’s practicing her _f_ sounds. “Furlong is a funny name.”

“Yeah, but we can only call him that here in the house, Cass.” Dan tells her, rumpling her hair affectionately. He smiles at Amy again, that specific grin he gets whenever he thinks Cassidy’s done something particularly cute and wants to see if Amy noticed it too: _look at our kid, Ames._ It does something to Amy’s knees. “How was your mom’s?”

“It was…long.“

“Seriously, is that a real pie? Did you _cook_ something?"

“Very funny.”

“How was—“

“I need five goddamn seconds to myself.” she snarls at him, and bolts for the stairs.

“Nice to see you too, _honey._ ” he practically yells after her, obnoxious and horrible once again. She refrains from flipping him off—Cassidy’s right there, after all, and while she already can recite all the curse words known to man, they can at least keep the profane hand gestures under wraps for the foreseeable future.

Upstairs in their bathroom, she pulls off all her clothes and runs a bath with the hottest water she can stand and all the bubble bath she can find, so that soon the bathroom fills up with a scented haze. She practically hisses when she submerges herself, but after a second it feels impossibly soothing, like she’s boiling off all her angst. (And she doesn’t feel a bit bad about dumping Cassidy with Dan, they’re probably all wrapped up in some gross mutual adoration exercise anyway).

Sooner than she expected, though, Dan walks into the bathroom, evidently having made quick work of putting Cassie to bed.

“What the fuck, it’s like Cambodia in here.”

“Then go away.” she mutters, sinking deeper into the bubbles, but Dan ignores her, just walks over to his sink instead and starts his extensive nightly before-bed skin-care routine, which always takes _at least_ fifteen minutes. The man’s got more fucking serums and potions than Amy does.

“So who made the pie?” he asks, after a few minutes have passed.

“My aunt. One of them. They’ve already invaded the house. It’s like a fucking war-zone there, except with baked goods instead of bombs.”

“Yeesh.” he mutters. “Glad I missed it.”

“Well, they can’t _wait_ to meet you.” Amy replies, and almost manages to smirk when Dan makes a face at her in the mirror.

“How’s your mom doing?”

Amy bites her lip. She can’t imagine what her mother is going through right now. “Not great.” she sighs. “I think it’s starting to sink in…she cried again, today…and I just…I don’t know what the fuck to say to her…She’s, like, stuck in the house, obviously, she has nowhere else to go, and I don’t think she’s sleeping…I mean, how could she—?”

Dan looks uncharacteristically serious—and therefore, awkward—and on impulse, she ducks her head under the water so that she doesn’t have to explain further.

“Cassie’s asleep already?” she asks, after she’s come back up and all the water has trickled off her face. 

Dan shrugs around a mouthful of toothpaste. “Yeah. It’s late and she’s tired, sounds like she was fucking pecked at all day by your family.”

“Her and me both.” Amy says, darkly, to the bubbles.

“…Yeah,” she hears Dan mutter, over the sound of the faucet. He leans his palms against the counter-top and watches her in the mirror for a moment, almost appraisingly, and the air suddenly feels charged between them, sharp enough that Amy looks away. There’s a second where she wonders if he might try and get _in_ the bathtub with her.

Finally, he just clears his throat and says simply, “Come to bed soon, okay?” and leaves her there without another word.

Twenty minutes later,Amy finally works up the energy to get out of the bathtub. She washes her face to get rid of any smeared makeup and pulls on the first thing she pulls out of the laundry basket (a flannel shirt of Dan’s). She feels not better, exactly, but her mind has stopped whirring and the heat has burned off most of the tension in her limbs, so that her movements feel slow, almost langorous. Reality feels very, very far away; her emotions have all been boiled down to their most elemental parts. Missing her dad. Exhaustion. And...

Dan’s sitting up in the middle of their bed, pretending to watch tv and doing a hilariously bad job at it. Deliberately, Amy turns out the bathroom light and then crawls across the bed toward him, inserting herself between his legs and sitting up on her knees, so that they are eye-to-eye. Dan watches her warily, expectantly, eyes flickering down to her lips.

“Hi,” he says finally, in this low, intimate tone that never fails to make her breath catch.

“Hi.”

“Better?” His fingers are already skimming up her thighs, underneath the shirt.

“Yeah,” Amy says, and kisses him.

It’s gentle and slow for maybe a grand total of eight seconds, before Amy decides she’s over that, wraps her arms around his shoulders and sinks down fully into his lap, rolling her hips once against him slow and teasing in the way she knows he likes. Dan groans and thrusts back against her at the same time he bites at the soft skin under her ear, and that’s when everything gets hot and blurry and _real_ very fast.

They kiss frantically, messily, all teeth and tongue, and she’s practically panting in Dan’s ear before he even gets his hand on her breast. She’s completely naked underneath the shirt she’s pulled on, and the friction between the fabric of his sweatpants and her core (he's already hard beneath her) sends delicious jolts of electricity through her body all the way to her fingertips.

This is what she needs right now, this is what has _always,_ without fail, worked for them, this connection. She doesn’t have to _think_ when they’re doing this—she can just let Dan take her to that place where there’s nothing but the two of them, locked together, trying to outdo one another, making each other go fucking _crazy (_ with need, with fury). It’s like fighting and making up all at once, as natural as breathing. There’s no space for anything else here, it’s just her and Dan and he’s _hers,_ she knows how to make him buck and groan against her, and he’s right there where she needs him, everywhere and all around her at once, reminding her that she’s _his._

“Amy—“ Dan mumbles, kissing his way harshly across her jaw, up her neck. His tongue traces the soft shell of her ear before his teeth sink into her earlobe. Amy swallows her moan when he bites down, feels a rush of damp heat building at the base of her stomach. She pushes him back so he’s flat against the comforter, and before she can even fully straddle him, Dan’s got his fingertips on her clit, stroking, teasing.

“ _Please—_ “ she hisses, somewhere in the vicinity of his shoulder. She needs his mouth on her, anywhere, and she frantically starts unbuttoning the flannel shirt. Thank fucking God, Dan takes his cue at once, stopping her hands and just yanking it down so he can get his mouth fully on her breast. She whimpers again and lets her mind go blank, giving herself over to Dan’s mouth and his fingers, the scrape of his stubble against her skin, the welcome roughness of his fingers as he slides two of them up into her, and crooks them gently. Amy moans and rocks against him. 

And then, suddenly—it stops working.

Out of nowhere, into the blissful _nothing_ that’s filling up her mind, that fucking _hole_ inside her rips open again. Suddenly there’s that poisonous _anguish_ filling her up again, and she’s completely unguarded, she’s got no walls up like this, entwined with Dan, and it’s too unbearable, it’s like her insides have turned to acid.

Amy jerks away, so violently she slips off Dan’s lap and collapses next to him with a little cry.

“ _Wha—_?” Dan gasps dumbly into the air between them. His fingers left a damp streak on her thigh, that’s how quickly she wrenched herself off of him. 

“Fuck, fuck, shit— _sorry!_ ” Amy wills herself to sound okay, but her voice is shaky and she’s trembling, automatically reaching for something, anything to cover herself more fully. For a second she’s worried she might throw up.

“Jesus _fuck_ , are you okay?!” Dan demands fiercely, rolling over to look at her more closely. His eyes are so black. Oh god, she can’t look at him. “Amy—“

“I’m fine, I just—“

“ _Fuck_ that, you can’t pull shit like this and say you’re fucking _fine._ ” He pauses for an awful moment, while Amy shuts her eyes and tries to take long, slow breaths. “Did I…did I hurt you?”

“ _No.”_ She has no idea how to explain what happened. It’s not like she was thinking about her father while they were kissing, just that all of a sudden, in his arms, the loss felt too sharp, sharper than it had felt even the night before. “…I just felt…I just felt sick for a second.”

In spite of the fact that less than thirty seconds ago he had two fingers buried inside her, Dan looks like he’s catching on way too quickly.

“Is this, uh…a thing?” he begins, tentatively. “Like…a grief thing?”

“Oh my god,” Amy mutters. The absurdity of the situation is suddenly inescapable. It’s too hilarious seeing Dan trying to work out if this reaction is a _grief thing,_ whatever the fuck that means, and she can’t hold back the sudden hysterical shriek of a laugh that echoes all over the bedroom.

“ _What_?!” Dan demands, his eyes wide. He looks completely non-plussed and frustrated. “What the fuck is happening to you?!”

“ _Nothing!_ ” she gasps again, and flings her arms over her face in order to get her control back. Everything seems hilarious and heartbreaking all at the same time. “It’s nothing! I just…I just need a minute, okay, can you just…”

Dan gets out of bed without another word, goes into the bathroom, and slams the door behind him.

“Oh fuck,” Amy hisses, her breath coming out all high-pitched and desperate. The tv is still on—one of those stupid CNN late-night documentaries. She fumbles for the remote blindly and turns it off.

Fuck, fuck, she can’t believe it, she can’t believe what just happened. She thought…she thought the previous night had been _it,_ that there would be no more scenes or triggers, God, she can’t fucking live her goddamned life if she’s at risk for breaking down all the time, if they can’t even…shit, now she’s already fallen apart in front of Dan _twice,_ he’s going to be even weirder, he’s going to think she can’t do her job with the bill and outsmarting Jonah, and…and…

For a second she wants to run away—to get out of bed and grab some shoes and her keys and just go _—_ but she’s too drained and anyway, Dan would probably flip out if he comes out of the bathroom and finds her gone. Or maybe he wouldn’t give a shit. Maybe she’s fully pissed him off now, and he’s stewing behind the bathroom door, jerking off in a rage.

So instead of running away, she grabs for her phone. It’s so fucking soothing just to hold it and check her work email and to feel in _control,_ she almost starts crying in relief. Shit, she _absolutely_ has to go into work tomorrow. She is not spending one more day thinking about her dad anymore than she has to.

A few minutes later, the bathroom door opens and Dan emerges, looking as though nothing unusual has happened in the last ten minutes. This time, it’s Amy who watches him warily as he approaches her across the bed. Because he’s Dan, the second he’s within reach he grabs for her phone, takes it directly out of her hands like he’s a fucking toddler, and tosses it aside onto the mattress.

“Amy,” he says, roughly. “Can I—just come _here._ ” And he pulls her back against his chest at the same time she gives up entirely and lets herself collapse into his arms like she wanted to the second she arrived home tonight. God, maybe this is what she needed instead of sex, just Dan holding her, his big hands massaging the tension out of her shoulder blades. Amy shuts her eyes and just breathes him in, listening to his heartbeat. It’s almost as good as her phone. Thank fuck he doesn't want to actually talk about it. 

He seems almost _too_ calm and placid, though, that after a while she has to ask. “What, did you jerk off in the bathroom?” She keeps her tone business-like, almost harsh, to cover up her complete and profound relief that he’s still here.

Dan snorts into her hair. “No, I fucking _wish_ …your temporary psychotic break was a pretty effective dick-wilter.”

“Then…what were you doing in there?”

“I was giving you a fucking minute, okay? Like you asked for.”

“Wow, I…I’m…” Her brain is fogging over again, from exhaustion and the warmth of Dan’s skin, so it’s hard to find words. “…I’m speechless, Dan.”

He just chuckles in response.

“Thank you,” she mumbles into his chest, a few seconds, or minutes, later. She doesn’t mean just for tonight.

“Yeah,” he replies, softly, his voice pitched so low she almost doesn’t hear him.

Amy’s almost dozed off when Dan clears his throat and says, “Just promise me you weren’t thinking about your dad right when we were about to do it.”

“Oh my god, gross, _no,_ Dan, what the fuck is wrong with you.” She scoffs in disgust and turns away from him to rearrange her pillows and the comforter, preparing to _finally_ go to bed after this endless day.

He just laughs again and slides into bed behind her, wrapping an arm around her waist so that their hips are aligned and her head is tucked just underneath his chin. Presses a quick kiss to her neck. “Cool, just had to check.”

“Go to sleep, you Freudian sicko.”

She doesn’t really sleep, though. 

Dan does. He’s always been a quick sleeper, and he’s out not much longer after she turns out the light, his hand going loose on the curve of her hip.

But Amy lies awake for most of the night, staring up at the ceiling, thinking about her dad. The house fills up with quiet around her, except for the familiar sound of Dan’s breathing and the heat switching on and off. This big, safe house, the kind of house that her dad always wanted her to have. Except that the house wasn’t even her idea, it was Dan’s. This whole…thing, all of the flowery extra details of her life that her father was so relieved to see, they were all because of Dan.

She had the house and a kid and a nice car, and even a husband, she had everything that her father had always wanted for her…except that the husband was Dan and her kid was his kid too, and they had a rotating cast of housekeepers and babysitters to deal with the house and the kid, because her job was destructively all-consuming and a lot of it involved shouting vulgarities into cell phones at hapless congressmen and interns at all hours of the day and night, with Dan at her back, usually yelling with her. Dan, all over her life, insinuating his way into every single part.

Her father had always hated that. But now he’s dead, and he died without warning, before she was ready. Before they had their last real conversation, a conversation that could fucking prepare her for his death. Before she could promise him once for and all that she was, for a complete lack of a better word, _happy._ Fuck, she barely remember their last phone conversation…it had been about something so mundane, so basic, like maybe when they could watch Cassidy next, or maybe the weather? Something he was doing in the yard? She can’t evenremember if she said “I love you” when they hung up.

It’s fucking morbid, but she keeps wondering if he knew what was happening. When he collapsed, when he was in the ambulance, when they were wheeling him into emergency surgery. If he knew it was coming, if he knew it was the end. He was always so stoic, but if he had known, he might have said something to her mother. But maybe he didn’t. It _kills_ her to think of her father’s last seconds as moments of fear or uncertainty, the thought makes her bite her pillow to keep back a howl of rage and pain.

Around three she manages to doze off, wakes up at five in the dark, confused again. _What’s happened?_

Then she remembers again, dully, lets the pain wash over her _again_. Jesus, this is already getting old.

Amy gets up immediately and takes her phone into the bathroom. She has no intention of not going into work today, of sitting around and going through another day like the last two. She doesn’t care if it’s a good idea or not.

And anyway, she needs to fucking _fire_ that intern who leaked the news about her dad.

The sound of her hairdryer wakes Dan. She knew it would, he’s never really gotten over those two years he operated on a morning news schedule. He comes stumbling into the bathroom in his boxer briefs, his hair on end.

“You’re going to work?” he rasps, squinting in the bright lights of the bathroom.

Amy turns and glares at him. “Yeah, is that a problem?”

“Uh, no,” he replies, extremely unconvincingly, and walks over to turn on the shower like that was the original reason he walked in the bathroom in the first place.

“Well it shouldn’t be.” she continues sharply. “Do you realize how much work we still have left with the bill? Liz has got meetings with four different Senators today, and we have to prepare for her last CNN town hall, which, by the way, I’ll have to miss because of my fucking family.”

“Whatever,” Dan snaps at her. “I just want to make sure that I’m not going to get some hysterical call from Sophie later wondering where you are.”

“Sophie knows that I have a real job.”

“Preaching to the fucking choir, babe.” And he flicks water at her in retaliation before hopping into the shower. It’s only Monday, and Amy can’t believe it’s _only fucking Monday_.

 

* * *

 

Senator Elizabeth Halliday’s office is in the Russell Building, on the second floor. They’ve only been in this office since January—when Amy first came to work for her, she was stuck in some back corner of the Hart Building, but now they’ve made it to the Russell, just three offices down from Carol Hallowes.

Amy likes working for Liz. She’s tough and competent, which is more than you can say for ninety-five percent of the people in Washington, and she also hasn’t entirely sacrificed her sanity and dignity on the ladder-climb to power, nor is she particularly interested in forcing Amy to lose her sanity or dignity either. Working for her reminds Amy of her earliest years with Selina, the two of them cruising around Washington getting shit done (uh, sort of getting shit done). But where Selina ran hot, shrieking vivid insults without the slightest provacation, Liz is cool and icy. Amy’s seen her raise her voice maybe four times in the entire four years they’ve worked together. Her perpetually unruffled nature sometimes got on Amy’s nerves, it’s barely even seems _natural_ …but then again, Washington probably feels like a cake-walk compared to Afghanistan.

“There’s still time.” Dan likes to say. “We haven’t pushed her through a presidential campaign yet.”

Dan likes Liz because she has potential and is bloodthirty enough to put everything in her life on the table for him to manipulate—a female veteran, married to a military lawyer, mother to two robust blonde boys a few years older than Cassidy. She’s got enough conservative support as a result of her military career, she’s got a lock on the veterans vote and all middle class women, basically. Hollywood likes her because she’s not ugly and they can never fucking resist an underdog. Unlike Selina, Liz doesn’t have to fake some hard-knocks origin story. Her father worked for a logging company in upstate New York, and she joined the military to pay for college.

She’s going to be President one day, if Amy has anything to say about it, and _nothing_ is going to get in the way of that.

Liz doesn’t say anything when she gets to work and finds Amy at her desk in the outer office. She just lets Amy conduct the morning staff meeting as usual (all of them do a pretty bad job of hiding their surprise she's at work, but whatever the fuck, they’ll do as they’re told). But when Amy comes into her office to prepare her for their hospital tour later that day, Liz asks her to sit down in the seat across from her desk, which is how Amy knows something is up. They usually do their planning and plotting on the sofa or the armchairs.

“So, Amy.” she says, pleasantly, and tucks a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. From the back, she and Amy look related.

“…yes?”

“I hope that Dan passed on my condolences to your mother and sister.”

“He did.”

“And how is Cassidy doing?” Unlike Selina, Liz actually enjoyed her children…it was something they had bonded over, when Amy first came to work for her: motherhood and all its completely wild and frustrating insanity.

“Uh…” Amy remembers their conversation yesterday evening in the car. “I think she’s…processing. It’s only been three days." Only three fucking days and she feels like she'll barely make it through one more. 

"Mmm." Liz rests her chin on her hands and scrutinizes her with an expression of professional curiosity, like she's an interesting policy proposal, or maybe a new plant for the office. Amy's starting to feel like she's at a congressional hearing. 

“Amy?”

“...What?”

“You know you have a deputy, yes?”

“Of course.” Her deputy is useless, some third cousin of Liz’s husband’s college roomate, or some other fucking remote connection, a complete waste of a government salary.

“Just checking.” Liz replies, smoothly as ever, as if she only asked Amy in here to confirm the date of some fundraiser. “Of course, you take whatever time you need, whenever you need it, no questions asked.”

“I don’t need time, ma’am.” Amy replies shortly, without even thinking, because at this point, it’s becoming clear that this will never fucking get better, she can never do enough to make this devastation go away.

“Fair enough,” Liz shrugs. It's clear that she’s not particularly interested in talking about Amy's feelings, as long as Amy makes it clear they won’t get in the way of anything. “When you find out who leaked the story about your father, please feel free to fire him or her in the main office, where we can all watch.”

Amy lets all her breath at once and almost manages a smile. “Thanks, ma’am. That…that’s very kind.”

She works intensely all day and tries not to think about her dad. She fires the intern, sits in meetings, ignores phone calls from Sophie, argues with senators, runs over to the Speaker’s office to do some hand-holding over the bill, and spends fifteen minutes going off on Richard over the phone when he accidentally calls her instead of the Secretary of Agriculture, which is quite honestly is more effective than any therapy she could buy. It doesn’t actually put her in a good mood, but she does decide to leave work a little earlier than usual.

She texts Dan to say that he can stay late if he wants, and picks up Cassidy from school herself. Cassidy is _extremely_ over-excited because during lunch she discovered that she has a loose tooth, her very first one. As a result, she can barely sit still, explaining to Amy in great detail how many other students in her class have lost teeth and what happens if she does and she hopes there’s not too much blood and that they don’t have to yank it out with a string.

Amy sets her loose in the house when they get home and doesn’t even try to pretend she has the energy to make dinner. She orders in instead and pours herself a giant glass of wine and paces around the kitchen while she waits, restless.   
  
Her dad had pulled out all her baby teeth. She had always kind of assumed he would do those types of gross, squishy, hands-on things for her kid. Somehow, she can’t _exactly_ picture Dan wanting to pull out any of Cassidy’s teeth himself. The image actually makes her laugh. 

Dan finally gets home, late, after they’ve eaten. Amy’s on her laptop in the kitchen. Cassie emerges from the very expansive block castle she’s building in the living room to intercept him the minute he walks through the front door, to tell him all about her tooth. When he finally makes it to the kitchen, he’s got Cassidy in one arm and a stack of polling data in the other, looking faintly disgusted at the topic of conversation.

“When you lose a tooth, you get to bring it to class and show everyone.” Cassidy's explaining. “And Ms. Browning writes down how you lost it.”

“ _Really?_ ” he says, in the fake-interested voice he uses whenever they’re forced to listen to some mindless kid bullshit that both of them are very bad at pretending is interesting. One time Cassidy recited the entire plot of the latest Pixar movie on a long car ride to New Hampshire, and Amy thought she would need to break her own eardrums.

“Yes!” She’s wriggling around in his arms now, so Dan lets her go. “And Ava said the tooth fairy brought her thirty dollars when she lost her first tooth.”

“Jesus, _thirty_ dollars? That seems like a lot for a first tooth.” He drops his pile of charts next to Amy, grabs her face in his hands, and kisses her deeply, opening her mouth with a flick of his tongue and moving his lips against hers almost forcefully. They _never_ do things like kiss hello and goodbye, because they're not...because they just don't do shit like that. There’s a hint of frustration behind it, and she’s not sure where it’s coming from.

“Hi?” she asks him, suspiciously, when he pulls away. He just shrugs at her, his face curiously blank.

“Don’t I get to make a deal with the tooth fairy?” Cassidy demands from the kitchen floor. 

“I don’t think that’s part of the tooth fairy's contract, kid.”

Cassidy scoffs, puts her hands on her hips and says darkly, “I need some _opposition_ research on this lady.” Then she turns around on her heel and stalks dramatically out of the kitchen.

“Shit, does this mean one of us is going to have pull a fucking _tooth_ out of her mouth?” Dan mutters. Immediately, he reaches for the wine bottle.

“Well I’m sure as hell not doing it.” Amy frowns at him. “And none of this tooth fairy bullshit, by the way. It’s not even a real myth.”

“Fine, then you tell her.”

“ _You_ tell her. You're going to be in charge in all teeth-related affairs from now on.”

“Wait, why the fuck do _I_ have to do it?”

He’s so fucking childish, and Amy flares up in response, annoyance zinging through her bloodstream. “A dead dad is a get-out-jail-free card, genius.” she snaps at him. 

She doesn’t realize what she’s said until the words are already out of her mouth. Immediately, her heart starts pounding in her ears, and all her extremities go so numb so fast it feels like they’ve turned to ice.

Dan doesn’t realize what’s happened. He’s wandered over to the refrigerator and is looking inside it with both doors open, which is a habit he knows that she hates because it drives up their electricity bill. 

“Damn, how long does that last?” he grumbles. “Hey, did you order that Thai chicken salad thing with the ginger—whoa, what happened to your face?”

She doesn’t respond. Vaguely, she realizes she’s stood up off the high kitchen stool, her phone in her hand. The words are echoing through her brain, like a foghorn. A dead dad is a get-out-of jail-free card. _A dead dad is a get-out-of jail-free card._

_A dying dad can be a get-out-jail-free card, like with Furlong._

_Wow, that is cold. Also, kinda hot._

“Amy? Seriously, you’re not blinking…”

She forces herself to blink, and Dan comes back into focus. He’s looking at her, confused but not concerned, not like he was last night, so he hasn’t figured it out, he doesn’t think (yet) she’s losing it again.

“I…I just remembered something—“

But at that moment there’s a crash from the living room, signaling that Cassidy’s gotten herself into some mess, and Amy takes that as her opportunity to escape. In the half second that Dan turns his face in the direction of the living room, she slips past him and hurries up the stairs without another word, where it’s blessedly dark and quiet.

That conversation with Dan in the hospital, all those years ago, which she hadn’t thought about until yesterday morning…the rest had come rushing back to her. _A dying dad is a get-out-jail-free card._ She had said it then, matter-of-fact, safe in the knowledge that her father was recovering. But now she’s said it _again_ and her dad has only been dead for three days, three days that have felt like three years, and she's _already using him_. She’s so fucking horrified with herself she wants to claw off her own skin.

She was always so fucking _busy,_ busy running doomed campaigns and trying to save Selina from herself, too busy turning Liz into a national figure, too busy with Dan and all their fucking drama, too busy building a life that her father had never really wanted for her…god, how many fucking times had he called her and she’d told him she didn’t have time and would call him back? Jesus, probably thousands since she started working in politics.

She can’t believe—she can’t believe that it slipped out, as though her father’s death was something she could fucking _use._ What the fuck is the matter with her, she’s not fucking Dan _._ What the fuck has she even been _doing_ _?_

Amy can't think about it, or she will absolutely fucking lose it. And her life is too fucking full to lose a single day. She has Dan and a kid and a health-care bill to pass and a dumb-ass President to remove from office and she has to get her shit in order.

Her phone vibrates. It’s Sophie.

_Cousins in 2mrw, drinks downtown, come, dont b a bitch._

Fuck this ragged fucking _hole_ that’s inside of her, eating through her insides like acid and she _has_ to make it stop somehow and she can’t find a way. Only that bitter desperation could make her respond, which she does, her fingers still shaking: _sure, will be there._

 

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally this entire story was supposed to have been written from Dan’s point of view, but I struggled with the narrative momentum in this section, and out of desperation, I switched to Amy’s POV. But there were some implications for the plot that I had to work out as a result, which is why this chapter is so long. I may try and work in Amy's POV one more time, but we'll see. 
> 
> Thanks so much to everyone who has been taking the time to comment. Each one has been so thoughtful and meaningful to me. Writers live for feedback and you guys are truly the best. xx


	7. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content note: By pure coincidence, this chapter contains a reflection on Dan’s sexual relationships with women, written from his perspective. Dan is an objectively garbage human male, so please feel free to skip that part if you wish to.
> 
> I wonder a lot about how I would think and write about Amy and Dan’s relationship if Mandel had been in charge of Veep for its entire run. Sometimes shipping Dan-and-Amy feels like shipping two separate couples, and I guess this is my way of admitting that I loved episode 7.03* and remain strangely optimistic for the rest of the season (I even feel like a baby might still be in the cards). At the same time, I have watched episode 2.02 *a lot* while writing this story, and I miss the old world of the show so much. 
> 
> (*Except for Dan sleeping with Sophie again. Come ON.)

* * *

If I didn't believe in you,

We wouldn't be having this fight.

If I didn't believe in you,

I'd walk out the door and say,

"Cathy, you're right."

But I never could let that go,

Knowing the things about you that I know.

\- jason robert brown, _the last five years_  
 

* * *

 

It’s going to be a fucking weird week.

Amy’s up at the literal crack of dawn on Monday, which definitively ruins his plan for some lazy, early-morning sex that’s supposed to make up for not having any sex the previous night. By the time he gets out of his own shower, she’s already dressed and downstairs, sipping coffee as she watches CNN in the kitchen. Cassidy’s barely wandered down the stairs in her pajamas, dragging Richard-the-lobster behind her and blinking in confusion at all the early morning action, before Amy is kissing her on the head and practically running out the damn door.

He’s not fucking stupid. He knows _exactly_ what Amy’s doing, and she can just go right on and fucking do it. 

She’s clearly not ready for him to fuck her into feeling better about the inconveniently-timed-sudden-death-of-her-father, which, like, that’s obviously _fine,_ he wasn’t going to force it. But last night, in their bed, they were literally seconds from going at it and something had _spooked_ her. And so it’s just _manifestly_ clear that Amy isn’t processing shit about her dad’s death. She’s just walking around like a wounded animal, slowly bleeding out, desperate to be touched but still skittish as fuck, and refusing to talk.

And he doesn’t know what the hell to do with that. If she’s not ready for sex, not ready to talk… for fuck’s sake, those are the only two things he and Amy are _good_ at.

Well, they’re good at talking about work, at least.

“Does Mommy have a vote?” Cassidy asks, clearly thrown off by all the early morning action. 

“No, but she’s sure as hell acting like it, isn’t she.” Dan tells her, because he is in no way above complaining about Amy to their kid. “What do you want for breakfast?”

“I’m tired of everything we have.” she pouts. “Can we go to Starbucks instead?”

Dan just gives her an unimpressed look, since she clearly thinks with Amy out of the house she can pull one over on him. Still, he weighs convincing her to eat something here versus fighting off the morning crowd at their regular coffee shop six blocks away. Both options seem equally annoying, until he remembers that it’s early enough they can probably avoid the rush. The sun has barely risen, that’s how fucking early Amy roused the entire house. 

“Yeah, screw it.” he tells her. “Get dressed and we’ll go.” 

But he doesn’t get any respite from the internal chaos caused by the death of Amy’s father. Thanks to that fucking intern, the news has apparently spread to every professional corner of D.C. No less than _nine_ people come up to where he and Cassidy are ensconced at an outdoor table to offer their condolences about Amy’s father and ask fucking nosy questions about when the service is going to take place and was it unexpected and will it affect anything with the bill and please don’t hesitate to call if he _needs_ anything (that’s from one of the mothers in Cassidy’s kindergarten class, a thirty-eight year old divorcée who works at a private law firm on H Street.) 

Most of these people aren’t even _important_ , they have nothing to do with the health-care bill or Jonah’s bare-bones administration, they’re just Washington worker bees who like (or fear) Amy and he can’t even get anything out of them because they’re all too low on the food chain. They just think he has something to fucking _say,_ and he _doesn’t._ Why the fuck should he? He’s Dan Egan, Washington kingmaker, not Amy Brookheimer’s fucking emotional secretary.

“Actually, I’m just trying to enjoy breakfast with my daughter.” he finally grits out at some low-level congressman whose name he can’t even be bothered to remember. “It’s all been a _real_ shock for her.”

On the other side of the table, looking impossibly serene in the pale spring sunshine, Cassidy hums while she colors over the paper place mat the waitress gave her. She doesn’t look at all like anything in the world is upsetting her. There’s the equivalent of a five-year-old smirk lurking at the corner of her mouth, and Dan glares. His fucking kid.  

It’s not any better at work. 

The minute he gets into the office, Melissa’s waiting for him with a stack of messages from concerned senators who, having finally watched the disastrous end to his TV segment yesterday morning, are worried about coordinated opposition to the health-care bill, even though Dan spent his entire Sunday afternoon threatening the minority leadership with extremely graphic visions of nuclear-level political retribution if they so much as accept any overtures from Jonah’s wannabe banana-republic of an executive branch. 

“Jonah has not become a political mastermind in the last twenty four hours.” he growls to Melissa. “But sure, I can sit in as the congressional therapist, that definitely sounds like a good use of my fucking time.” 

“And, Mr. Egan, where should I send the flowers?” Melissa asks, hurrying to catch up with him along the corridor. 

“The flowers for who?”

Melissa looks a bit more uncertain. “Um…the flowers for…for your wife’s—”

“—for _Amy_ —“ 

“—for her family….” Melissa finishes, looking awkward. 

Dan just blinks at her. “…what?”

“Flowers, Mr. Egan.” Kent says, coming up behind them. “The niceties must be observed.”

“…you’re sending flowers?” he repeats blankly. “To Amy’s family?”

 _“_ Yes. Do you have an address for Melissa to give to the florist?” Kent’s slowed down his speech just a fractional amount, but it’s enough that Dan can tell Kent thinks he’s being a real fucking idiot right now.

“You have Amy’s number, ask her.”

“Or I could ask you. He was _your_ father-in-law, after all.” Kent replies, blandly.

 _No he wasn’t,_ Dan thinks, automatically, stupidly, before he remembers that Kent is technically correct. Something about that phrase, this morning, after spending an entire breakfast dodging inquiries from phony well-wishers who thought he had _feelings_ about Amy’s dad just because he’s her _husband_ …it makes him feel fucking claustrophic.

“Whatever _,_ I have no fucking idea, her mother’s, maybe.” he snaps at both of them. “Can I please have three goddamn seconds to settle in before we start on the etiquette lessons?”

Kent raises an eyebrow. “I can postpone the usual morning meeting by forty-one point two seconds.”

“Great, I’ll fucking take them.” Dan retorts, and bangs his way into his office. He hears Kent say, audibly, to Melissa, “I advise you to leave Mr. Egan in his self-imposed time-out for a while. I’ll get the address from Amy,” and that’s when Dan slams his office door shut with such force that Cassidy’s preschool graduation picture falls over on his desk.

The morning continues to suck. Sophie calls him a few hours later, just as he fucking predicted.

He ignores the call, because of course, and the two calls after it. Finally, in the middle of a meeting with Kent about a special election in Ohio that’s somehow gotten on their radar screen, Melissa buzzes in over the intercom, announcing tentatively, “Mr. Egan, it’s a Sophie Brookheimer for you?”

“What?!” Dan barks at her, completely taken aback. What the fuck does Sophie have to talk to him about that’s so fucking important that she’s called him _at work_?

For a second, his mind does this wild swoop through the absolute unthinkable— _something’s happened to Amy_ —before he remembers that she can’t have died in a fiery car crash because she forwarded him an email about Cassidy’s upcoming parent-teacher conference less than forty minutes ago, and if something _had_ happened at work, someone in Amy’s office would have called him—it wouldn’t be fucking _Sophie._

Kent raises an eyebrow. “…Amy’s sister?”

“Uh, yeah.” Dan mutters, distractedly.

“Then I would like to remove myself from the room for this conversation,” Kent says, and moves as fast as Dan as ever seen him.

“Should I tell her you’ll call her back?” Melissa asks.

“No, fuck it, I’ll take the call.” Dan groans, and grabs the phone. “Sophie, how the hell did you get this number?”

“It’s on the Internet, dipshit, you’re not the CIA.” she retorts immediately. “Do you know where Amy is?”

“At eleven-thirty on a Monday? I’m going to take a fucking wild guess and say…work.”

“Well, she’s not picking up my calls.” Sophie says irritably. “We’re trying to finalize the date for the ceremony, and, like, it would be nice if Amy at least pretended to give a shit about her dead father.”

Dan grits his teeth, thinking about Amy the previous two nights, crying on the landing outside Cassidy’s room, shaking and borderline hysterical in their bed last night. Not giving a shit has never been Amy’s problem, and it’s definitely not the problem now.

“So will you please tell her to call me? You two are always fucking joined at the hip.”

“I will pass on the message.” he mumbles, and prepares to hang up the phone.

“Oh, and in case _you_ are interested in coming, we’re thinking it will be the 4th of April.”

The date sets off alarm bells in his head. “Wait, no, shit, Sophie, that date doesn’t work for Amy, the vote is two days after that.”

“…Huh?”

Jesus. He translates, hastily. “Amy has a work thing on the Monday after April 4th. A…huge work thing. America hangs in the balance.”

Sophie laughs derisively. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one too many times. America always hangs in the fucking balance with you two. If Amy wants a say, she can call me herself.”

And she hangs up on him unceremoniously.

Dan shoves the phone back into the receiver with a lot more force than usual. He can’t believe he’s spending part of his morning being treated like Sophie Brookheimer’s fucking messenger boy.

 _“_ Melissa!”

“Yes?”

“Whatever the fuck you have to do to block Sophie Brookheimer’s number from the office mainline, _do it._ I don’t care if you have to upgrade the phone contract for the whole goddamn building.”

He’s furiously texting Amy _call your fucking sister NOW_ when Kent pokes his head back into the office.

“Crisis averted?”

“Temporarily.” Dan mutters, throwing his phone aside and getting up from his desk. “Tell me again why we’re having a meeting with some low-rent Ohio special election staffers? ”

“It's a favor to Furlong.”

“Since when do we do fucking _favors_ for people?”

Ben comes up behind them in the corridor and slaps Dan lightly on the back of the head. “Since always, Danny-boy, and we need you on your best behavior.”

Dan bares his teeth at both of them in his most sociopathically charming grin. “Happy?”

Kent just grimaces. “Yikes.”

Ben squints at him. “It seems off.” he comments, as though he’s critiquing Dan’s golf swing. “Take your fucking fiber supplement or a shot of whiskey or whatever it is you’re missing this morning, and get your head in the game.”

Dan regards him suspiciously. “Why, who’s at the meeting?”

He wonders for a moment if it’s someone he’s fucked. Obviously it wouldn’t be the first fucking time he’s walked into a conference room and seen an inconveniently familiar face at the other end of the table. But Ben and Kent usually don’t give a shit as long as it doesn’t get in the way of anything. (Also, Dan’s almost _positive_ Kent’s got a secret crisis list locked away of every woman Dan’s had sexual relations with since he first arrived in Washington as twenty-one year old summer intern. Ben’s, got, like, crazy shady contacts with foreign security. Dan is reasonably certain he’s got them all under surveillance.)

“No one you know.” Ben shrugs, once again reinforcing Dan’s suspicion about the surveillance thing. “I’m just telling you.”

Still, Dan realizes why Ben said something in the first second they walk into the conference room. The meeting is with the senior campaign staff for the party’s candidate in a special election in Furlong’s old district (they are absolutely taking this meeting as a favor to Furlong, the campaign manager is his wife’s first cousin, and Furlong is still maintaining the fiction that he gives a shit about his wife). They’re just in for a casual consult. It’s not a particularly _special_ special election, and they’re up by six points.

The director of communications, a brunette in her early thirties in a canary yellow designer dress that’s so tight he can see her ribs, has Dan in her sights.

Dan knows it immediately, from the way the back of his neck prickles the second he walks into the room. It’s never gone away, that impulse to size up every woman in the room, so he knows where he stands, so he knows what magnetic, pheromonal currents are available for him to manipulate. It’s a blood instinct, one that he’s always been able to recognize in others.

He can tell by the way her eyes fasten on his left hand, noting the single gold band on his ring finger with a raised eyebrow, like it’s a challenge. He fucking _invented_ that expression, okay? He knows what it means. During the meeting, she keeps leaning over to show him press clippings on her iPad, displaying precariously supported cleavage, and her knee keeps bumping his under the table. He halfway expects her to try and slide her heel up the leg of his pants. 

On a different day, he might be more accomodating, would try and use it for BKD’s gain. But this particular morning, he’s fucking over it.

The meeting is forty-seven minutes total, and he finds a way to mention Cassidy no less than thirteen different times. Twenty-six minutes in, he asks if there’s something wrong with her chair. Still, when it’s over, she slips him her card— _Summer Hayes,_ it reads, in shiny embossed script—and mentions, all casually, that they’ll be staying in D.C. for another week or so, for the networking.

She’s not ugly. He’s definitely fucked uglier, dumber, older women in his life, before he and Amy got their shit together. And she clearly knows what she wants out of him—a connection, an opportunity, a call into their Ohio network.

Look, Dan used to fuck _a lot_ of women who did not know better. They slept with him because he promised them whatever would open their legs, and they believed him; they believed the personal and the political were always separate (ha); sometimes, because they were young, and they were _there._

And he also fucked a lot of women who did know better, who went into it with their eyes as wide open as his, who were using him just as much as he used them. And some of them still wanted that. They didn’t believe in Dan Egan’s improbable, imperfect transformation from Beltway libertine to…whatever it is that they think he and Amy are doing. They wanted to see it with their own eyes—they wanted to hear him decline another drink, to see him shake his head at the prospect of a shared cab or shrug off a stray hand on his arm. They wanted to know how far he’d still go.

He had learned how to work that interest just as neatly to his own advantage, without actually fucking anyone—he’d had to, back when he was trying to convince Amy that whatever was happening between them was more important than a satisfyingly convenient fuck in a strange hotel room with a strange girl whose name he’d forget thirty seconds after coming on her tits.

To his eventual delight, it turned out that the “Daddy Egan” persona was actually far more effective politically than “Danny Egan, Beltway libertine.” And it was easier now. More time had passed, things were settled, he and Amy were a known commodity, their professional and personal fates intertwined. Offers like Summer’s—it _was_ an offer, she had practically given him her fucking room number—come less and less.

But…he’s still Dan Egan, and this is still D.C. He still works and breathes and _revels_ in the treacherous, exploitative, unsavory cesspool of Washington politics. People have affairs. People fuck other people who aren’t their spouses. People use sex for professional gain. It happens everywhere, all the time.

He’s just not one of them, anymore.

Still…the conversation with Kent and Melissa from earlier in the morning keeps echoing through his mind. _Your wife’s family…he was your father-in-law, after all…_ he’d thought the death of Amy’s father wouldn’t affect him that much, wouldn’t change anything about their own relationship, which has always been so…separate. And yet, the fucking weight of it suddenly seems to hang around his neck. He tries to imagine another week, another _three_ weeks, like this, everyone demanding shit from him and having… _expectations_.

The idea makes him itch.

 

* * *

 

The meeting throws him off more than he’d like to admit. When Amy texts him that she’ll be picking up Cassie and he can stay late, he gladly takes her up on the offer, barricading himself in his office for some fucking peace and quiet. He spends the late afternoon and the early evening conferencing with Liz’s communications team about the final health-care town hall event they’ve got lined up this weekend, brainstorming different approaches and trying to anticipate all the different ways Jonah could fuck them up between now and Saturday morning. He’s not scheduled to go, and he’s got a vague recollection of Amy going off in her 6am bathroom rant about how she’s no longer going, because of her family, so in the likely event that _neither_ of them go, Liz’s team has to be extra fucking prepared. 

When he finally gets home, the first thing that greets him is Cassidy tearing into the entry way, screaming, “Daddy, Daddy guess what?! Guess what?!”

She flings herself at him and he just manages to catch her, somehow managing not to drop the fucking metric ton of polling data that Kent sent home with him to give to Amy. “ _Oh sh—_ oh god, hey Cassie, what’s up?” Jesus, what can she be so excited about 8:10pm on a Monday?  

“I have a loose tooth!” she exclaims, practically vibrating with excitement. “Look, look!” 

She pulls down her lower lip and practically shoves her mouth into his face and, uh, _gross,_ the absolute _last_ thing he wants to do right now is look really closely at her teeth. He kind of gives her mouth a cursory glance as he starts moving for the kitchen. Probably he grimaces a little, too tired not to.“Uh, wow.”

She studies him skeptically. “Did you _really_ look?”

“ _Yep._ ” he lies shamelessly. “Your first loose tooth. Did you show Mommy?”

Cassidy launches into a long and extremely detailed explanation about the mechanics of losing teeth that he doesn’t really bother to pay attention to as he makes his way through the lower floor of the house, into the kitchen. Amy’s sitting at the island with her hair piled on top of her head, looking exhausted but significantly less wound-up than she did this morning. She looks up at him over the edge of her laptop with the little smile that she sometimes gets when she watches him and Cassie together, like she wants to be skeptical of the whole thing but can’t, her own happiness getting in the way, and she’s trying not to let it show. 

Dan _loves_ that look on her—it feels like a win every time, sends triumph shooting through every single vein like a drug. He doesn’t even tease her about it that much. Not today, anyway, not when he’s been henpecked about her fucking family all day, not when he was basically propositioned by some minor Ohio communications director looking to move up. All he really wants is a goddamn reminder of why he’s putting up with that sort of nonsense on a daily basis. And that expression on Amy’s face…that’s the reminder. Fuck everything else. 

Once Cassidy’s back on the kitchen floor, still going on about her teeth, he grabs Amy’s face in his hands and kisses her, seriously enough that it eases the knot that’s been building in his chest all day. 

Typical Amy, she just stares at him dubiously when it’s over, and he knows why she’s caught off guard, because it’s not something he normally does, and the fact that he’s let himself get so thrown off by today pisses him off. For fuck’s sake, he’s not some suburban dad who kisses his stay-at-home wife _hello_ when he gets home from his mindless job at the bank, who wears the same shirt for every day of the week and whose idea of a wild night out is a fundraiser at his country club. He is not that fucking guy. 

He needs a drink.

He’d also rather not think about what’s happening inside Cassidy’s mouth, but she’s still stuck on the topic, refusing to be forgotten even though both of her parents are _clearly_ having a moment. 

“Shit, does this mean one of us is going to have pull a fucking _tooth_ out of her mouth?” he grumbles the minute Cassidy leaves the kitchen to start plotting how to grease the tooth fairy, or whatever the fuck she’s up to. Amy gives him a very unsympathetic look. 

“Well I’m sure as hell not doing it.” she frowns. “And none of this tooth fairy bullshit, by the way. It’s not even a real myth.” She’s fucking obsessive about not letting Cassidy get hung up on things like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and all that shit designed to shelter children from the reality that the world is a cold, dark, and hopeless place. He kind of feels like that’s about to be tested in the coming weeks, once Cassidy figures out that her grandfather dying doesn’t mean he’s just “gone” for a few days. Shit, he can’t believe it’s only been a few days.

“Fine, then you tell her.” 

“Very funny, Dan. You’re in charge of all teeth-related affairs from now on.”

“Wait, why the fuck do _I_ have to do it?” He’s got the city’s most exclusive dentist on call, for Christ’s sake. There’s no fucking way he’s pulling all of Cassidy’s baby teeth out of her mouth, one by one, for the next six years.

“A dead dad is a get-out-jail-free card, genius.” she tells him heatedly.

Dan rolls his eyes and yanks open the doors to the fridge. “Damn, how long does that last?” he tosses at her over his shoulder, the response coming as natural as anything. He stares inside the fridge unseeingly for a few moments, too wrapped up in figuring out how long they can postpone figuring out to deal with a loose tooth. Couldn’t biology have fucking waited another three weeks, until things were more settled?

“Hey, did you order that Thai chicken salad thing with the ginger—whoa, what happened to your face?”

Amy’s standing now, clutching her phone, staring off into space. She’s gone all pale again, her eyes unfocused and huge. Not panicked or distressed or like she’s about to burst into tears…just stunned. Fuck. This can’t be teeth-related.

“Amy? Seriously, you’re not blinking.”

There’s a crash from the living room.

“Damn,” he mutters. “Cassie?”

“It’s fine!” she calls back, which means it’s probably not fine at all. He groans and turns his head to exchange an exasperated glance with Amy—but Amy’s gone. In the five seconds he looked away, she’s escaped up the stairs without saying anything. And somehow, he doesn’t think it’s to escape whatever mess Cassie has gotten herself into.

“Shit,” he mutters.

In the living room, he halfway expects to find a broken lamp or one of the legs missing off of the coffee table, but it’s just Cassie, surrounded by a mass of wooden blocks that a minute ago must have been stacked together.

“My castle fell over.” she informs him crossly.

“Oh,” he says, stupidly in relief. “Sorry, kiddo.”

He sinks onto the couch and puts his feet up on the table, cradling his wine glass, and watching Cassie reorganize her blocks. She’s intensely focused in a way that reminds him of Amy, her brows furrowed low on her forehead, clearly blocking out everything else around her. For some mysterious reason, she’s wearing cowboy boots, a ballet tutu, a pair of butterfly wings from Halloween last year, and a Yankees baseball shirt that he picked up for her the last time he was in New York.

“What, uh, what are you playing?”

“I’m the tooth fairy,” she says matter-of-factly, from the ruins of the blocks. “ _Duh.”_

“Nice,” he comments idly, turning on the tv. “Does the tooth fairy like the Yankees too?”

“No comment,” she tells him snottily, one of the phrases she throws around by virtue of spending an inordinate amount of time backstage at various campaign events, words like _opposition research_ or _polling margin of error,_ when of course she’s got no idea what it means

For the next half hour, Dan goes back and forth between the TV and his phone, while Cassie slowly rebuilds her castle. He sort of hopes Amy will come back down, but evidently whatever happened to her, she’s dealing with it upstairs, alone. Eventually, the hunger pangs get too strong to ignore, so he goes back into the kitchen for the pie that Amy brought home yesterday, because he might as well eat _something._

“Aunt Elizabeth made that.” Cassidy explains, climbing directly over the coffee table onto the couch and rumpling the covers of some of Amy’s massive health-care policy books.

“Cass,” he says exasperatedly. “For Christ’s sake, walk around the fu—around the coffee table, not _on_ it.” 

“I’m sorry.” she says, as guilelessly as possible but clearly with an ulterior motive. “Please, can I have some pie too?”

“Who’s Aunt Elizabeth?”

Cassidy makes a face at him. “Don’t be silly, Daddy.”

Shit, he thinks, as he hands her a fork. Now he’ll have to ask Amy. It occurs to Dan that this kid, half-his, is about to be connected with a much wider group of Brookheimers than he (and Amy, probably) ever intended. Amy’s never said much about the extended Brookheimer clan. He doesn’t know anything about her cousins, if her parents come from big families (he has a very bad feeling that her father doesn’t _only_ have three sisters….) To Dan, “the Brookheimers” were just Amy and her mom (and her dad), with Sophie and her kids minor inconveniences to be dealt with as needed. And fuck knows he has no plans for Cassidy to meet _any_ of his extended family _ever,_ not that he’s in contact with any of them.

“What’d you do at your grandmother's yesterday, anyway?”

She cocks her head to the side, thinking. “I played with Alyssa. We colored, then we watched a movie.”

“Did you spend some time with Am—with your grandma, at all?”

She nods. “We talked about Grandpa. She misses him.”

“Mmhmm.” Dan shovels a forkful of pie in his mouth to avoid having to say anything more.

“Grandma’s sisters were there too. And Aunt Sophie was there.” Cassidy frowns. She fucking hates Sophie, not that she’d have learned otherwise in their household. “Mommy talked with them all day. They were on their phones a lot.” She takes a dainty bite of the pie and makes a little face. She doesn’t really like nuts yet.

“Did you show _Aunt_ Elizabeth—“ he just barely refrains from sketching quotation marks in the air “—your butterfly tattoo?”

“It’s almost gone now.” she sighs. “But Mommy says I can give my cherry blossom picture to Grandpa later.”

It takes Dan a second for his brain to really compute what she said—or rather, process what she said and realize that he absolutely has no fucking clue what she means.

“…What?” he asks her, looking at her more closely.

Cassidy blinks at him, as though worried for his memory. “When we say goodbye to Grandpa. I can give him my picture. From Friday. That Mommy asked for.”

“Uh…sure,” he begins. “Did she say…how you are going to give to him?”

“No,” she shrugs. “She says there will be a big…” she pauses, thinking of the right word, “…party and we can give him things. We just won’t be able to see him, because he’s dead.”

 _Jesus_ , _Ames,_ Dan thinks to himself, _ease up on the morbid honesty._

“Okay, sure.” he tells her. “You can give him whatever you want then.” Please, _please,_ he’s already hoping she forgets this entire conversation, and whatever Amy told her yesterday. This is what he was fucking afraid of, Cassidy and her existential questions.

They get through more of the pie, although Cassidy puts her fork down a lot sooner than he does and spreads out leisurely against the couch cushions. “Do I have to go to school tomorrow?”

“…yeah.” Dan replies, vaguely, his eyes on the preview for tonight’s _Late Show_. “Why wouldn’t you go to school?”

“Alyssa says she’s not going to school at all this week.” Cassidy informs him. “Because Grandpa died. She says we are _breaving._ ”

Dan laughs aloud before he can stop himself. “You mean _grieving._ ” She’s too fucking cute sometimes.

“Yeah, that.” she corrects herself, then straightens up to look directly at him, basically pushing her face into his line of sight. Then she blinks imploringly from underneath her long, tangled black eyelashes, her Amy-eyes wide and beguiling, her expression as self-serious and angelic as, well, as any politician. “ _Pleaseee?_ No school?”

Yeah, she’s un-fucking-deniably his daughter. 

“Sorry, kid. School tomorrow, as usual.”

She drops the façade at once, flumping back against the couch cushions and pouting, and he can’t help but let out a little chuckle, reaching out to tug affectionately at her ponytail. He probably should be more worried about how easily she’s just completely, unconsciously tried to manipulate him. But tonight, all he can scrounge up is a faint sense of resigned admiration.

“Speaking of school…” he checks the time on his phone. “Bedtime. Time for a bath.” They had skipped it the night before because she was so tired.

“Can I stay up and watch tv with you?” she tries again.

“Nope.”

“I never get anything I want.” she grumbles.

He laughs again. “Wow, that’s not even close to be being true. Let’s go.”

Getting Cassidy ready for a bed drags on a bit. She’s a good sleeper, but has never liked the actual process of _going_ to bed, and it’s always a giant production getting her to settle down (she’s not unlike Amy in this respect). He probably shouldn’t have let her have some pie right before bed, but _oh well_ , lesson fucking learned. She’s fidgety and over-hyper, getting water all over the bathroom floor on which she promptly slips and bangs her elbow, and to get her to stop wailing he has to pretend it’s _very_ serious and put a Muppet Babies Band-Aid on it. Then she lingers in front of her bookcase, making up excuses for things she forgot downstairs, like Richard and a glass of water and her watercolors, and all told, he’s about four seconds away from picking her up and dumping her bodily into the bed. By the time she’s _finally_ sleeping, (after he’s had to read aloud half a chapter of a condensed version of _Jane Eyre,_ because _Amy_ ) he’s pissed that Amy hasn’t emerged from their bedroom or wherever the fuck she’s hiding to speed up the process herself.

Inside their bedroom, he finds Amy lying on her stomach on top of the comforter, in her pajamas, fingers flying across the screen of her phone. Not an unusual position by any means, but he can’t believe she’s just been up here the _entire time,_ not doing anything, probably listening to him read aloud about Jane Eyre on the fucking moors like a real fucking idiot.

“Uh, _hello.”_ he demands, slamming the door behind him with more force than probably is strictly necessary.

Amy jolts and then glares at him. “What?!”  
  
“What the fuck happened to you?! You looked like someone had taken a piss in your drink and then I glanced away for two seconds and you fucking disappeared.”

“It was nothing.” Amy says fiercely, eyes back on her phone. “I’m fine.”

“Oh, okay, so _fine_ that you’ve been hiding out here for the past hour and a half? Yeah, I totally buy that.” he retorts as sarcastically as possible. Amy keeps on thinking that she can pretend all her shit is together, but he’s not that fucking obtuse.

“I haven’t been hiding, I’m fucking _working_ , I had Cassie all evening until you came home, I thought it was your turn to handle her for a bit and I could enjoy some fucking peace and quiet.”

“Amy—“ he begins, in complete exasperation. “Can you just—“

“ _What?!”_ she practically shouts. There are two spots of pink, high on her cheekbones. “Is there something in particular you want me to _do_ right now, Dan?! Something that will make this _easier_ for you?!”

Dan opens his mouth, reconsiders how badly he wants to win this argument with the ghost of Amy’s father suddenly hanging all over the room (on a scale of one to ten…maybe a seven and a half, which is fairly low when it comes to arguing with Amy), and instead goes about getting ready for bed in the most ostentatious and magnanimously manner as possible, so Amy will grasp that he’s being a _real_ fucking gentleman by not pressing the issue. In return, Amy ignores him loudly enough that he can physically sense it, a special talent of hers honed by years of practice. When he finally crawls into bed, he kicks at her ankles on purpose.

To his surprise, Amy doesn’t kick back, just rolls over suddenly so that she’s facing him instead of the TV.

“Here,” she says gracelessly, and dumps her iPad in his lap. “Liz sent some thoughts on a strategy for overriding a potential veto.”

Dan’s starting to have his doubts about their ability to override a veto—nothing he’s heard in the past twenty four hours indicates that they can somehow get six more senators over to their side—but he has no desire to get it into a fight about it now. Instead, he just makes a face at Amy as he fumbles for his reading glasses on the bedside table. (They’re a recent addition to his image. At first he had resisted—he was Dan Egan, his eyes were _perfect,_ thank you very much—but the first time Amy had seen him wearing them, she locked them both in the handicapped restroom in the basement of the Hart Building and sucked him off so hard his vision went blurry for a different reason entirely. He kept the glasses.)

He skims the document sitting up against the headboard, with Amy on her stomach next to him, finishing whatever extensive email on her phone, her face on level with his elbow. In the quiet, the tension between them starts to unspool.

“Cassidy wanted to stay home from school tomorrow.” he volunteers after a while. “Because of your dad.”

“Oh?” Amy immediately looks up, her expression concerned. Neither of them wants to talk about how any of this might be affecting Cassidy. Obviously, Dan’s in the camp of pretending everything is fine until it’s visibly _not_ fine anymore, so he’s not exactly sure why he’s even bringing it up now.

“But only because Sophie’s kids aren’t going to school.”

“ _Oh._ ” Amy rolls her eyes. “Then she’s fine. Just jealous.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. She put on a pretty good show trying to convince me, though.”

“All kids are baby sociopaths, Dan. Even the ones who don’t have you as a father.”

“She’s not a _sociopath_ , Ames, she’s just…figuring out what she’s capable of.”

Amy wrinkles her nose. “Who the fuck are _you,_ Dr. Frankenstein? Tone down the mad scientist vibe, please, she’s not your super villain protegée.’

Of course, Dan loves that idea—what’s the point of even having his own brilliant clone if he’s not allowed to pass on his extensive and profitable life skills—but he’s more interested in proving to Amy that he doesn’t fall for Cassidy’s baby bullshit anymore than she does.

“You think it works on _me_? I fucking invented the art of manipulation.”

Amy shakes her head, but she has that little smile from earlier on her face, the _I-can’t-fucking-believe-you-don’t-hate-this_ smile. “You actually think you’re Machiavelli reborn, don’t you?”

“I’m a lot hotter than Machiavelli was.” he smirks, and puts his hands behind his head, so that his arms and his chest muscles are shown off to their best angles. “Definitely an upgrade for you.”

“Ugh, this conversation is officially over.” Amy decrees, looking disgusted. She puts her phone aside and burrows under the covers. “Machiavelli was a genius, by the way.” she tells him, in her most superior, know-it-all tone. “If you ever bothered to actually read something he wrote, your career might not have stalled so many fucking times.”

“Oooh, can I borrow your lecture notes from college? Don’t tell me they aren’t lying around in some box upstairs, I know you.”

“Like I’d let you anywhere near my notes.” She smirks mischievously at him from her pillow, her cheeks pink and her eyes bright and teasing, clearly enjoying toying with him, and suddenly he fucking _yearns_ to go back in time, to Friday morning, when he could have this version of Amy all the time, before her dad died and blew everything up. 

For now, he just chuckles and puts a hand on her head. “Get some sleep, you nerd.”

Amy eventually falls asleep with her head cushioned in his lap, her blonde hair spilling everywhere and one knee hooked over his leg. When it’s just them, like this...just their bed and their screens, bantering and tossing ideas off of one another...the way Amy whimpers in her sleep when he has to temporarily move to turn out the light…it's the easiest thing in the world. None of the other bullshit—dealing with work, being expected to answer questions about Amy’s dad, not fucking other women, raising their kid—none of it seems too hard, not like this.

 

* * *

 

On Tuesday, Amy texts him that she’ll be home late and not to expect her for dinner. Dan assumes she’s going back out to Maryland and just doesn’t want the bother of taking Cassidy with her.

Amy doesn’t get home until _late_ late, after Dan’s made dinner and helped Cassidy begin her weekly kindergarten homework: find four things in the house that begin with the letter D and draw them (Jesus, kindergarten is fucking _dumb_ ). More to keep himself entertained than anything else, he tells her that it’s a race to see how fast she can find the four things. She goes tearing all over the house and comes back with a dress, a stuffed dalmatian puppy dog and the leftover pie from Amy’s aunt—dessert.

“Time!” she shouts, when she comes skidding into the living room and flings herself onto the floor, clutching the stuffed animal.

“This is only three things,” he tells her, smugly, because he’s not going to bend the rules even for a made-up game.

“No,” she says smugly, and then points to him triumphantly. “You’re number four! Daddy!”

“Or, you know, _Dan._ ” he suggests wryly, mostly to cover his embarrassment at being owned by his own kid, but she’s already collapsed into crazy giggles of delight at her own joke. Kids are so fucking weird.

After she’s done laughing at herself, she spends the next forty five minutes drawing an extremely unflattering portrait of him, with weirdly dramatic eyebrows and overly sharp teeth bared and dark dots all over his face that he assumes are supposed to be freckles but actually make him look like he’s contracted leprosy. All in all, it’s a pretty humilating experience watching it come to life.

While Cassidy’s drawing, he ignores two phone calls and then a voicemail from his mother, answers a call from a BKD underling who’s just received an inquiry from some California congressman who’s been caught on camera with a hooker (Dan tells him to refer to the “sex scandal crisis template” in Kent’s files), and starts drafting a speech he’s ghostwriting for Pierce.When it’s bedtime, he reads Cassidy the Pierce speech until she falls asleep, which doesn’t take long at all. (It’s not like he’s wasting any energy trying to write an interesting speech for some inbred cactus-munchers out in Nevada.)

He’s lying on the couch, nursing a beer and trying to work up the energy to move again when he hears Amy tumble into the front hall and call out “I’m home!” which is his first clue something is up. Amy _never_ announces she’s home.

“…Ames?” he calls back, uncertainly, in case something’s wrong.

“Dan?” She appears in the entry to the living room, one arm halfway out of her trench coat so it dangles off her shoulder. Her cheeks are flushed and her hair is falling in her face and she looks…not sad, for the first time in days, but also a _lot_ more on edge than she did this morning. She’s practically vibrating, and not in a good way. He can feel it all the way across the room.

“Hey,” he says, pushing himself up. “What happened to you?”

“ _Hi,_ ” she repeats, breathless, fidgety. “Nothing. I went out.”

“You went _out_?” he repeats in disbelief. Amy hardly ever goes out voluntarily _._ Usually Dan’s the one dragging her to some exclusive cocktail hour he insists they can’t miss as a “couple”.

“Yeah, so? I can go _out_ with people.” she retorts, defensively. She shrugs the rest of the way out of her trench coat; it falls directly on the floor and she makes no move to pick it up. Dan scrutinizes her for a moment, before it starts to dawn on him.

“…Are you drunk?”

“ _No._ ” she scoffs, making her way slowly toward the couch. But she trips over the block castle that Cassidy left out from yesterday and basically crashes on top of him, crushing him into the sofa cushions, and then she starts _giggling_ in his ear, high-pitched and sharp and almost manic. She smells like tequila and her perfume, her hair cascading everywhere. Dan is suddenly wide awake, his arms full of her, her skin soft and cool against his fingers, electricity zipping down his spine.

“Oh my god, you’re _so_ drunk.” he tells her, laughing in spite of his unease over her demeanor.

“I am _not_ drunk.” she insists, sitting back on his lap and pushing her hair out of her face. The movement practically sends her tilting into the other side of the couch; Dan grabs her around the waist to steady her, and also to conveniently settle her body more firmly against his, the sides of her slim black and white dress riding up her thighs. She glares at him, and he smirks reflexively.

“I went out with Sophie.” she explains. “We had _…multiple_ margaritas.”

“…you got drunk with _Sophie?_ ” This doesn’t make him feel any better.

“One of my cousins came into town.” she sighs. She threads her fingers through the hair at the back of his neck. “Sophie was restless. She says you’re supposed to get drunk when your dad dies.”

Dan shrugs at that. “I mean…she’s not fucking wrong.”

“And getting her drunk was better than how she’s been all week, fucking _manic_ , crying over the phone one minute and then giving me shit about work the next. So. Tequila seemed easier than dealing with _that_ for one more single second.” As she speaks, she gets more agitated, breathing fast, her fingers tightening around his neck, the alcohol flush deepening and her eyes getting wider and darker, like they always do when she’s furious.

These are all things that Dan normally loves to see on her. Amy’s _fucking_ gorgeous when she’s worked up, about anything at all, and it’s never hard to turn her on if she’s already angry about something—it’s not like anger and arousal have ever been separate emotions where their relationship is concerned—but still, something’s off. Why the fuck would Amy want to voluntarily spend time with _Sophie_? And to actually drink enough so that she’s like this, with her guard completely down…he doesn’t like it at all. There’s no fucking way her dad dying has changed things _that_ much between them.

“Wait.” It’s just occurred to him. “How’d you get home?”

“The car’s at work, dummy. I met them downtown.” She pauses for a second, then smirks at him. “It’s _cute_ that you worried though.”

“Whatever.”

“I left early, actually.” she sighs. “I told Sophie I had to come home to my _husband.”_ She pronounces the word like she’s saying _dirtbag,_ wrinkling her nose accordingly.

“Wow, you must be _really_ drunk.” he laughs. “Calling me your husband in public. That’s pretty shameless of you, Ames.”

“Don’t be an ass.” She pushes his shoulder, which does nothing except propel her further against his chest, so that she has to tilt her head up to look into his face. “I was making a _factual_ statement, that’s all.”

But she has that look on her face where she’s trying to glare but can’t suppress the smile underneath, the corners of her lips quirking. She looks the most like _Amy_ since last Friday, equally ready to punch him or kiss him, the dark restlessness evaporating away, and he’s so fucking relieved all he can do is keep teasing her.

“Oh _no,_ don’t take this moment away from me, Amy, _please,_ I’ll remember it _forever—“_

“Shut _up—“_ But the rest of her retort is swallowed up by his mouth, because he can’t resist her like this anymore, flushed and furious in his arms, eveything feeling so perfectly fucking _normal_ between them that he has to take advantage of it.

Amy makes a little noise of want and immediately relaxes into it, completely unrestrained without any further physical coaxing on his part, wrapping her arms around his neck and opening her mouth against his. Her tongue is surprisingly cool, with the faintest tang of tequila that merely heightens the sensation. Dan actually groans a little in his throat when it hits his tongue for the first time, surprised, immediately hungry for more, and Amy smirks against his lips as he deepens the kiss. She nips his bottom lip when he pulls away to press slow, open-mouthed kisses down her neck, at the same time sliding his hand up over her leg to the top of her stocking, teasing the soft skin there. He trails his mouth over her collarbone, brushing his lips over the hollow at the base of her neck. Amy hums against him, her mouth brushing his ear. It’s the most reassuring thing Dan’s felt in days.

When Dan lifts his head, she moans, digging her fingertips into his shoulders. “Wait, please—“ But then she yawns, widely and irrepressibly, and immediately she looks so surprised and furious at herself that his first reaction is to laugh, stroking her thigh soothingly.

“Sleepy?”

“ _No_.” she says mutinously, sounding exactly like Cassidy. “No, I…”

“It’s okay…“ he reassures her, trying to sound as calm as possible. The _last_ thing he fucking wants is a repeat of Sunday night, for her to completely wig out when they’re all over each other. He knows it wasn’t about him (she claims, anyway) but it still unnerved the _shit_ out him. Jesus. That’s never happened before, and he never wants it to happen again. Fucking is _exclusively_ supposed to get them both off, not turn Amy into a trembling, panicky mess.

“But I want— _”_ she practically whines, then practically on the turn of a fucking dime appears to give in. “Oh, _fuck_ it. _”_ she mutters, and slumps against him, resigned, her forehead landing against the edge of his jaw line with an audible _thunk._

Dan shifts her in his lap, slightly, so that she’s curled into his side rather than resting directly on his dick, leans his head back against the top of the couch, and conjures the image of his Great-Aunt Mildred wearing Amy’s fucking ugly flannel nightgown from all those years ago in New Hampshire. Meanwhile, Amy’s gone tense, her forehead still pressed firmly against his jaw, and he can practically hear her thinking.. He hopes that she’s not fighting the urge to throw up. His leisure-wear is extremely expensive.

“Dan?” she asks, after a while.

“Hmm?”

“Do you remember when my dad had his first stroke?”

“…Yeah.” Shit. This sounds like a fucking minefield of a conversation.

“Do you remember when you came to the hospital with me?”

“Uh…” He _barely_ remembers that day, it was fucking ten years ago, what is he, a fucking presidential historian? He has a hazy impression of fielding nosy questions from Sophie and her mother about that time they dated for like five fucking minutes…Amy’s dad glaring at him the entire time…Amy looking trapped in the corner of the room. Mostly, he remembers wanting to get the fuck out of that room, and to take Amy back with him.  
  
“…Vaguely.” he finally manages to offer.

He waits for her to respond, but she doesn’t, just lapses back into silence. She’s got that dark, agitated look again, like she’s thinking about something deeply unsettling. Her eye make-up is starting to muss. It’s like looking at a very sad, blonde raccoon.

“Ames?” he prompts her eventually. Instinctively, he reaches out to swipe ineffectually at a sparkly smear of eyeshadow, and she blinks at him as though she’d forgotten he’s there at all.

“…I hated you a lot, then.”she just says.

“Yeah, I don’t think you did so much.” Not then, anyway (other times…yeah.) But Amy doesn’t even react, doesn’t get all defensive and self-righteous about how much of a selfish dickhead he’s been for the majority of their relationship, and he knows that wasn’t what she meant to say at all. For a second, he wonders if this has anything to do with what happened last night, when she fled upstairs in the middle of their argument about Cassidy’s teeth and wouldn’t tell him what was wrong.

“Hey,” he says, more quietly, and he’s only saying this out loud because she’s very drunk, and won’t remember in the morning that he said it at all. “Ames. You can fucking talk to me, you know.”

She sighs and looks away from him, her eyes going bright. 

“I don’t want to fucking _talk_ , Dan.” she mutters. “I already…crying all over you was excruciating enough.”

The irritation that suddenly spikes through him at her words surprises him. _Was it?_ he wants to snap back at her. He’s getting fucking annoyed at Amy refusing to have any goddamn feelings around him, but he’s too tired to turn this into a real fight, not now, because even though her voice is harsh and her body is rigid, she’s still leaning into him like he’s the only thing keeping her upright. Considering how much she’s had to drink, it’s entirely possible.

“Guess what?” he says, after another few minutes have passed, in a last-ditch effort to lighten her mood. “Cassidy drew a picture of me for school, and she made me look like a fucking ghoul. Wanna see?”

He reaches behind her and grabs the picture off the coffee table. Amy takes one look and dissolves into laughter, real laughter this time, warm and delighted.

“Oh my _god_! What are you talking about? This is _so_ accurate.”

“I look like Jonah!” he whines at her, and Amy laughs harder, her whole side vibrating against him. “Look at my hair! Look at my _face._ ”

“This is the most beautiful picture I’ve ever seen.” she giggles, her words slightly slurred with alcohol and glee. “I hope they put it on that fucking lame art wall and show it off at the next Open House. I hope they _label_ it so everyone knows it’s you.”

“This is not funny, Ames. My street cred over there going to tank, and seriously, like half the shit we get done in this town is because I’m a fucking hot commodity with the parents’ association.”

“Who gives a shit about _that_ , it will be a healthy experience for you.” Amy teases, and leans her cheek against his shoulder again, soft and compliant and loose. “Maybe we should have it framed.”

“Maybe we should _misplace_ it on accident.”

“Maybe you should get the fuck over yourself. So she’s not an artist. What was this for, anyway?”

“Homework. Find four things that start with the letter _D_ and draw them.”

“Jesus Christ.” Amy mutters into his shoulder. “And we’re paying how much money to this fucking school?”

Then she yawns again.

“Okay, lightweight.” Dan says. He takes a firmer grip on her and stands up, so that he’s carrying her bride-style. “Let’s get you to bed.”

Amy groans theatrically, bending back in his arms—she’s definitely still wasted. “ _Dannnn_ , this is not an effective move anymore, I get it, you can carry me.”

“Ames, I will pay you one hundred fucking dollars if you can walk up the stairs in those heels right now.”

They bicker all the way up to the bedroom, automatically dropping the volume when they get to the landing so that they don’t wake Cassie, and Amy falls asleep approximately five seconds after peeling off her dress and pulling on the nearest t-shirt. Dan’s not really tired—having Amy writhing around directly in his lap for approximately twenty minutes isn’t exactly relaxing—but he doesn’t want to disturb her, so he goes back downstairs and does some mindless shit on his iPad for a while, flipping between the late night monologues and working out some answers for Liz’s town hall.

Amy’s snoring lightly when he finally crawls into their bed, and under normal circumstances he would elbow her until she rolled over and stopped. Instead, he just pulls her close against him, running his hand over the rise and fall of her waist and hip, and trying to match his breathing with hers.

“…where did you go?” she sighs, still mostly asleep.

“Just writing.” he whispers into her hair.

“The bed feels so big without you,” she mumbles drowsily, and Dan buries his smile in the soft curve between her neck and shoulder.

 

* * *

 

When his alarm goes off the next morning, he doesn’t roll over automatically to turn it off. Amy’s curled against his chest, practically underneath him (she complains that he likes to sleep _on_ her), and the bed is warm and the blankets are heavy and he really, really doesn’t want to get up. 

But then Amy growls in his ear, “Oh my god, _Dan,_ turn that fucking phone off before I snap it in half and shove the pieces up your asshole.”

“Mmmmph.” he mumbles into his pillow, and doesn’t stir. “I’ll get to it.” 

Amy knees him hard in the ribs. 

“Ow! Jesus fuck, Amy, what the hell?!” Dan pushes himself up on his elbows and fumbles blindly with his phone. Amy takes the opportunity to shove her head under a pillow. 

“Turn it off!” she practically shrieks, muffled by the sheets. 

“It’s not my fucking fault you can’t hold your alcohol.” The warmth between them from the night before has entirely evaporated now that Amy’s burned off her little binge, and Dan’s suddenly seething with her, for fuck’s sake, she doesn’t have to blame him just because Sophie tricked into her drinking more than one margarita.

“Do _not,”_ she snarls, “mention alcohol to me to right now.”

“Actually you could probably use some tequila right now, it would put you in a better fucking mood.”

“I am going to wrap this sheet around your neck and strangle you until your face is literally un-fucking-recognizable.” she spits at him, hissing like a goose. “They’ll have to call in an expert to ID the body.”

Dan scoffs at that. “Damn, Amy, when are you going to kick these psycho-bitch mood swings? Oh _wait—_ is this a menopausal thing? Are you going through _menopause_?”

Amy just lets out a strangled scream under her pillow, and kicks at him again, which is when Dan decides there’s nothing to be gained from lying here and infuriating her any more.

“And good morning to you, merry fucking sunshine.” Going for a run to burn off his own righteous indignation seems like a _very_ good idea right now.

When he comes back out of the bathroom, tugging on a t-shirt, Amy’s emerged from her pillow cocoon, blinking blearily like some sort of night creature. Her hair is all over the place and her face is puffy and her eye makeup is smeared all around her cheekbone.

“Wow, you look _terrible._ ” he observes, as insolently as possible.

She glares at him fiercely. “Take a picture, dickhole.”

“ _I_ am going for a run.” he informs her huffily. “Have fun waking up Cassidy.”

Amy seizes the bottle of ibuprofen on her side table and throws it at him. “Get. The. Fuck. Out. Now.” she orders, breathing so heavily with rage that he almost— _almost—_ makes a crack about her breasts. But he’s so pissed off at her that sex isn’t even the first thing on his mind.

“Feel better, _babe._ ” he snaps at her, and ducks out of the bedroom.

Of course, it’s fucking _raining_ outside, a misty, soupy drizzle that's finally replaced the spring sunshine of the previous few days. But he sure as hell isn’t going back inside the house, so there’s nothing to do except run until he can’t feel the chill anymore. Still, it gives him one more reason to feel even more pissed off at Amy, which he seizes on gratefully. If she hadn’t fucking forced him out of their bedroom so fast, he might have had the time to glance out the goddamn window.

It’s not the fight that’s got under his skin this morning, it’s the fact every single fucking argument they’re having now is related to the fact that Amy’s dad is dead and it’s tearing her up inside and neither of them knows how to deal with it. And there’s something else too...since Monday, there’s been something darker that’s bothering her, he can tell, something that’s not _just_ her dad dying, but also definitely related in some way. He doesn’t even really want to know what it is, except that it’s clearly fucking with her head, and he can’t have that.

Something _has_ to break. This whole one-step-forward, two-steps back pattern is driving him up the fucking wall.

Dan runs until he can’t tell the sweat from the rain water on his face and his lungs are burning, so hot he can barely feel the cold. By the time he gets home, he’s damp and panting, and ready for a long, steamy shower, preferably with Amy if she can stand to be in the same room as him.

Ignoring the fact the housekeeper just came by yesterday, he doesn’t shed anything at the front door, even though he’ll track in mud and rainwater, and walks straight into the kitchen for a glass of water. He finds Amy violently banging coffee mugs around the kitchen in her green dressing gown, wet hair glistening down her back, clearly fresh from her own shower. For a moment, he just watches her, residual adrenaline pounding through him, and the sight of her slamming cereal bowls on the granite countertop somehow makes it harder to catch his breath.

She starts a bit when she realizes Dan’s there, one of the bowls clattering from her hand. To cover her surprise, she crosses her arms over her chest and glares fiercely at him.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she demands.

And that does it.

In two strides, Dan’s crossed the room and he grabs her around the waist and practically slams his mouth against hers and there is nothing nice about the way he shoves his tongue her into her mouth _._ Amy gasps against him, still only for a second before she grabs for his shoulders, fingernails digging into the damp cotton of his shirt. He kisses her furiously, relentlessly, but Amy’s just as angry, just as insistent, her teeth clacking against his for a second before she sinks them into his bottom lip and tugs once, twice before sucking his tongue back into her mouth.

Just as suddenly, he breaks the kiss and puts her back on firm ground. Amy’s breathing fast too, looking a little dazed. Dan looks away from her as he gasps for more air, and wipes the back of his hand across his mouth. His head is pounding. So is his dick.

And then Amy’s hands are on his chest, yanking him down to her level, and she’s kissing him again, frantic and fierce, and Dan thinks _fuck it, we’re doing this now._

He gets his hands on her face so he control the angle better, works his mouth over hers until her face is in the exact right position for him to plunder her mouth with his tongue and his teeth, but it’s not enough, he needs more. As usual she’s too fucking small without heels on, so he just hauls her back up against him, running his hands over the curve of her ass and squeezing hard. The collar of her dressing gown fall back, exposing her shoulders, and he ducks his head to mouth briefly at her collarbone before slamming his mouth back to hers. Amy moans, low in her throat in a way that he feels more than hears, and knots her fingers into his hair, kissing him bruisingly hard. The pressure of her fingertips feels incredible, and he groans in response, shifting her so that every curve is pressed tight against him. Her dressing gown is crumpled between them, the thin layer of silk the only thing separating their bodies, and he can feel how hot her skin is underneath, knows that she must be able to feel him. He’s so hard it hurts.

“Dan." Amy whimpers urgently against his mouth. “ _Dan._ ”

A bit blindly—everything except Amy has gone blurry and unreal—he practically flings her up against the cool wall of the refrigerator and reaches for the tie of her dressing gown.

“Ow, fuck!” she cries, which is _not_ the reaction he was expecting.

“What?!” he pants. She’s all he can see right now—the flushed, creamy expanse of her shoulders and neck, her swollen mouth, and she’s twisting and arching away from the fridge with a very tense expression on her face, which is only driving him even more insane. He grips her waist, so she doesn’t fall to the ground, but the angle is shit and Amy locks her legs around his hips, so she’s clinging to him almost like a monkey.

“Fuck,” she hisses. “It’s all of Cassie’s fucking pictures—“

“Move them.” Dan tells her, his voice rough and low. Amy’s eyes darken and flash, flicking over his lips, and he can tell that she just got twenty-percent more turned on than she already is. Her legs tighten around him, so that the apex of her thighs molds entirely over his dick, and he groans into her neck. “Move them right the fuck now.”

Staring at him, Amy pushes wildly out with her hands; half the pictures go fluttering to the floor in a shower of magnets, and the rest they manage to push aside as he finally pushes her completely up against the refrigerator, so that she’s supported between his body and the cool surface behind her. Dan sends up one desperate, furious plea that Cassidy doesn’t wake up in the next fifteen minutes before he undoes Amy’s dressing gown, pushes it aside so he can run his mouth over her shoulder, up to this place on her neck, just under the hinge of her jaw, that he knows makes her crazy. At the very same time, she’s yanking his head towards that spot anyway. Dan smirks into her skin, and he knows that Amy must feel it because her fingers tighten painfully in his hair.

“You fucking bastard,” Amy moans, even as she tilts her head back so that her neck is even more exposed. He nips at that spot in retaliation, and Amy arches in his arms, her wet hair falling around his face like a curtain.

“Oh my god, shut the _fuck_ up and let me do this for you.” he grits out, and Amy rolls her hips against him at the same time she bites down on his ear, and then neither of them are really talking after that.

Now that they’re not running the risk of falling over, he curves his hands under her thighs again and just _goes_  for it _._ It feels so fucking good, to breathe her in and taste her and take her all for himself. She’s got her arms wrapped tight around his shoulders, keeping him as close as possible as he kisses and bites and sucks his way over her shoulder and her collarbone, and the little moans she’s making in his ear are fucking _obscene._ The damp heat between her thighs is unbearable, and he tries to slide his fingers between their bodies to brush her clit, but they’re pressed too tightly together. But maybe it doesn’t matter, because Amy’s grinding her hips against his mindlessly, feverishly, almost squirming with desire, and he can tell by the tension in her stomach and thighs that she must be close already, the pressure must already be enough. When he pulls back slightly so he can concentrate for a second on getting her in the exact right position for what he’s about to do, her eyes fly open in a fury.

“Dan,” she whines desperately, “Jesus, Dan, _fuck_ you, I need—“

“I know,” he groans, pushing her upwards a crucial few inches, fingers digging into her hips. “Shit, I _know,_ Ames.”

She must grasp immediately what he means, because soon she’s pushing down his running shorts with knees that are still locked tightly around his waist. And then his dick is sliding against her clit and she’s impossibly hot and wet, the chill of the fridge heightening the sensation, and both of them moan in tandem. As he kisses her fiercely again, sliding his tongue into her mouth, Amy’s shoulder blades slam back against the fridge, and her hips buck against him as the tip of his dick catches at her folds.

“No, wait, wait a second.“ she gasps, leaning her head back against the fridge. She looks fucking _wild_ , her eyes huge and dark, her lips swollen. Slowly, she reaches up over her head to grasp the top of the fridge with her hands. Dan is confused for exactly a nanosecond before he realizes that she wants to support herself better so that she can _watch_ him while he fucks into her, and immediately his desire for her spikes so intensely that the corners of his vision go blurry for a second. He’s never wanted anything in his _life_ the way he’s wanted Amy like this, wet and desperate and moaning for him, and yet just as equally in command, ready to make him do _anything_ to make her come, to make her his.

“ _Amy._ ” he breathes, and then he’s pushing into her, slowly, surely, savoring the slick, tight feel of her all around him. Amy keeps her eyes locked on his the entire time and the sustained eye contact between them is mindblowingly hot in a way that’s almost unsettling (for fuck’s sake, why does it feel like weeks since they’ve done this?!) It’s only when he bottoms out inside her, impossibly deep, that her eyes finally flicker shut. “Oh god,” she hisses, shifting fretfully, and when she opens her eyes again, her expression is so nakedly open and hungry that Dan’s thrusting up into her before he’s even realized he’s begun.

It’s fast and desperate in a way that it hasn’t been between them in a while, Dan fucking into her at an increasing rushed pace, Amy grinding down to meet him with every thrust, so close their lips keep catching. All the tension and frustration from the last few days is slowly bleeding out of them as they devour each other, fucking frantically and breathing each other’s air. Nothing matters now—not her crazy family, not that Ohio communications director who wanted to fuck him, not Jonah and his fucking veto power, not the fact that they can’t go two hours without fighting over stupid shit. Jesus, they should have done this sooner, they should have done this every day since her father died, he wants to fuck every awful, desolate emotion out of her, he wants to make her forget _everything_ but his name, he wants to make her feel like _herself_ again. The sight of her arching against him with her arms above her head makes him feel almost unhinged, like he wants to _shout_ into her.

“Fuck, Ames, _fuck,_ ” he groans instead, directly into her ear, and her breath catches on a sound that almost sounds like a sob. 

“Dan,” she whimpers frantically. “Shit, don’t stop, _don’t stop_.” She sounds exhilarated and impatient, and that’s more than enough to push him so close to the edge that his hips start to stutter. It’s not long at all before Amy has to let go of the top of the fridge and wrap her arms around his shoulders for more support as she pants deliriously into his neck, hissing words that he’s _way_ too far gone by now to pick up on.

Amy comes first, her head thunking back against the fridge as she gasps desperately for air, her legs squeezing impossibly tight around his waist, and then loosening as Dan keeps fucking into her, giving himself over to the furious pace he needs to reach his own climax. When he does, it’s with Amy whispering filthy encouragement in his ear, her lips skittering delicately over his jaw, and Dan can't think or speak or even breathe, he just gives himself over to it. 

And then it’s over, and sound slowly filters back into his brain, as though from very, very far away. The coffee maker beeps. Rain is still pattering steadily against the kitchen windows.

Amy’s gone boneless, sliding down his body wordlessly, and her feet have just barely touched the ground before his own legs practically give out beneath him and he trips over his running shorts that have twisted around his ankles. He lands back against the kitchen island and suddenly he’s sliding too, his back against the granite surface, and Amy basically collapses next to him, so that they end up sprawled on the kitchen floor, trying to catch their breath, surrounded by Cassidy’s cherry blossom watercolors and the refrigerator magnets that fell to the floor in their haste. Dan’s suddenly very aware that his clothes are still very wet, from the rain and sweat and sex.

“So,” he mumbles, after a few moments have passed and he’s got his breathing under control. “That was…refrigerator sex.”

“Yeah,” Amy says, sounding pretty dumbstruck. “Shit.”

She reaches out and grabs one of Cassie’s cherry blossom water colors, slightly crumpled.

“We’ll have to put these back…she’ll be mad otherwise.”

“You were _not,_ ” Dan says in disbelief, “thinking about _those,_ while we were doing _that.”_ He jerks his head up at the fridge, and Amy laughs, meeting his eyes and then glancing away quickly, almost shyly. She looks so fucked out, almost like she’s feverish, with her cheeks flushed this gorgeous shade of pink and the green dressing gown bringing out her eyes. Her hair is starting to dry in loose waves. There’s a bruise on her shoulder, and another one rising just underneath her jawline. Dan reaches out and pushes her hair behind her ear, fingers lingering on her cheek.

“No, I wasn’t.” she replies softly, and glances back at him. Her eyes are uncharacteristically still, like staring into Lake Erie on a cool, breeze-less autumn day. 

Dan’s about to kiss her when something starts buzzing in the vicinity, and they both start in surprise, automatically reaching for their phones. It turns out to be Dan’s, still in the pocket of his running shorts, and he swears when he sees the time.

“Fuck, I’m going to be late.”

He doesn’t hear Amy’s response, though. The message is from Kent—Summer Hayes, Ohio communications director, just stopped by the office to see if he was available for a drop-in meeting. _Just thought you’d want to know,_ the text reads.

“…What?” he says, vaguely.

“Dan, did you finally ejaculate the rest of the little brain matter left to you?! Go, get in the shower!” Amy’s staring up at him like he’s lost his mind.

“Right!” he replies hastily, and scrambles to his feet. “Hey, wanna get in with me?” he proposes, grinning at her. “Continue this morning’s hot streak?”  
  
“You just said you were late!” Amy protests, although she’s fighting a smile and he can tell she’s thinking about it. He smirks. Fuck Summer Hayes, and fuck anyone who wants him to be somewhere a second before he decides to be. He’s Dan motherfucking Egan, and he gets to fuck Amy Brookheimer whenever he wants and no one can mess with that this morning.

“Dead dad card.” he shrugs at her, borrowing her words from earlier in the week. Like he’s said multiple fucking times by now—they might as well get _something_ out of her dad’s death.

Something spasms briefly across Amy’s face, but he’s too absorbed in skimming his other messages to really pay attention to what it means. When he looks back, she’s reorganizing the pictures on the refrigerator with a strangely fixed expression. Her dressing gown is pulled tight over her body again, and that’s all he needs to know that she definitely won’t be getting back in the shower with him.

“Or not, your loss.” he says, a bit bummed, but whatever, he really is going to be late.

 

* * *

 

Upstairs, in the shower, the post-sex euphoria really sets in. Seriously, he feels one hundred percent fucking better about everything in his life right now. He fucked Amy up against the refrigerator and it was extremely hot and fucking cathartic for both of them and now they can devote some real attention to figuring out what to do about Jonah and the health-care bill, because things are getting down the fucking wire there. Amy will still be sad, sure, one fuck session isn’t going to fix everything, no matter how good, but it’s a start to getting her head back in the game. 

He comes out of the bathroom just as Amy reenters the bedroom. One look at her face, and his stomach plummets in disappointment. That troubled, dark expression from last night is on her face again, the same one he thought he had _literally_ just fucked out of her. Shit. Can’t she just let them bask in the triumph of crazed, desperate kitchen sex?! For fuck’s sake, he knows she _enjoyed_ it, he’s got the scratches on his shoulders to prove it. 

Immediately, Dan decides to ignore the evidence that mindblowing sex with him has not instantaneously fixed all of Amy’s problems, and instead goes into the closet to start getting dressed. When he comes back out, she’s standing by the large windows that look over their backyard, staring out at the rain, and the fact that she isn’t rushing around getting ready for work with him is maybe the most alarming thing that’s happened in the last forty eight hours. 

“Uh, you’re not getting dressed, Ames.” he says, as lightly as possible, yanking an undershirt over his head. 

She turns to him, so suddenly it’s almost robotic. “Do you really _not_ remember coming to the hospital with me when my dad had that stroke?” she demands, without preamble. Her arms are folded tightly over her chest, her eyes burning into him, so intense it’s uncomfortable. 

“Ames…” he begins, awkwardly, and shoves a hand through his hair, rubbing his palm over his eyes. He _really_ does not want to talk about that day anymore. “You already asked this.”

“You didn’t give me a real answer.”

“Well, you didn’t fucking explain why you wanted to know.” he shoots back at her, and her whole body stiffens. 

“You don’t remember _anything_?” That cramped sound again, in her throat.

“It was, I don’t know, how ever many fucking years ago—“

“Do you remember what I said?”

“Yeah, I remember you not thanking me for getting us out of there.” Dan cracks, a last-ditch effort to avoid this excruciating conversation that Amy, for some mysterious reason, is intent on having right this fucking second. 

“I said a dying dad was a get out of a jail free card.” she whispers harshly, and the air in the room changes. Dan stops pretending to look for a shirt and turns to look at her fully in the face, realization dawning over him. _This_ is what she’s been sitting on for days, he knows immediately, this is what she’s been torturing herself over. 

“Amy,” he says, but nothing else comes to mind. 

“And I said it again.” she continues desperately, suddenly looking wretched. “How could I say it? How could I _think_ like that? He’s _dead_.” She gets up and starts pacing frantically.

Dan doesn’t know what to say. “Ames, don’t be…he didn’t die because of _that,_ Jesus.” 

“I used _him._ ” She’s not even listening to him, caught up her in own guilt. “I used him when he was ill, I said he was dying when he wasn’t because it was fucking _convenient…”_

 _“_ So what if you did?” He probably should be trying to comfort her or hold her or some shit, but he doesn’t want to. What she needs is for him to knock her out of the mind-fuck she’s twisted herself into. “He was fine. It didn’t hurt him.” 

“How do you know?!” Amy shoots back, and she looks and sounds so heartbreakingly young. “How do you know I didn’t…fucking _jinx_ it, I said a dying dad was a get out of jail free card and now he’s permanently fucking _dead_ and now I have this _card_ forever.”

Dan just gapes at her. Jesus fucking Christ. No wonder she’s been acting so insane the last few days, if she’s talked herself into this level of fatalistic delusion over her dad dying. 

“First of all,” he tells her, heatedly, when he’s figured out what the fuck to say. “You will not have this card forever. For the next six months, maybe, but not forever. Second—what the _hell_ , Amy, you didn’t fucking cause this, I know you don’t believe that—“

“I know,” she stammers, as though trying to convince herself, and it’s so _weird_ for him to see her so uncertain of herself,  “I know, it’s just…Dan, my _whole_ life, since I was fucking eighteen, they practically had to drag me home if something was wrong.” She’s got that skittish, trapped look again, like any moment she might make a break for the bedroom door. 

“What the fuck are you even basing that on? The night he had that stroke, you wigged out so hard _Selina_ voluntarily let you go see him.” 

She lets out a little exasperated noise. “Oh, so you remember _that.”_

Dan rolls his eyes, but doesn't let up. “And you were there when he had the next heart attack or whatever it was, weren’t you?”

She swallows hard. “…I went to Nevada right after.” she whispers, as though furious with herself. There are tears in her eyes. “Once we knew he was going to recover.”

Fucking _Nevada._ “Well,” he says, icily. “As insane as that was, it still doesn’t make any of this your fault.” Still—because he can never resist rubbing in her face the fact that at one point in her life she willingly ran away to _Nevada—_ he barrels on. “Although I can’t imagine your dad was so thrilled at you running off to the desert for that yokel corncob string puppet who got his ass kicked in the primaries—“

“Oh, fuck you,” Amy snaps, her voice ragged and trembling. “You don’t know what my father thought about _anything,_ and you don’t know _shit_ about why I—“

She stops herself suddenly, and he knows why. They’ve gotten dangerously close, so close Dan can suddenly taste it, to having a different kind of fight entirely.

For a second, they size one another up across the bedroom: Amy, pacing by the windows, and Dan, looming in the doorway to their closet, neither of them even _close_ to being ready to leave for work. Any second now, Cassidy’s going to wake up and freak the fuck out that she’s late for school.

Amy breaks their staring contest first. “Forget it,” she says, roughly, and she swipes at her face, dashing away a tear. “Why am I even trying to have this fucking conversation with you—“

Dan just groans audibly at that, trying to communicate the depth of his annoyance. Whatever she says, she fucking married _him_ , he’s legally the closest fucking person in the _world_ to her, and even if he doesn’t _want_ to talk about anything, she needs someone to listen to her. “Who _else_ are you going to have this conversation with? Amy, for fuck’s sake, this isn’t hard, you didn’t cause your dad’s death and I _know_ you know it, get the fuck out of your—“

“You don’t understand—“ she practically spits at him, and then the tears start really coming, dripping down her face relentlessly, too fast for her to stop them. “You fucking hate your parents _—_ but it’s all I can hear, in my head, every fucking second, all the times I didn’t care enough, all the times I said I was too busy…”

She breaks off and turns away, fully crying now and trying to hide it from him. Watching her, Dan suddenly feels so, so tired, energy draining out of his limbs so fast he actually leans back against the closet doorframe. He doesn’t know what the fuck to do anymore. He doesn’t know how this fucking _ends._

Suddenly, on the other side of the house, there’s the sound of a door banging open. Both of them start, immediately yanked out of their own emotional shitshow and forced back into dealing with another one entirely. And this one they can't ignore no matter what. “Oh fuck.” Dan mutters. Cassidy’s awake.

“Mommy!” Cassidy screams hysterically. “We’re _late!_ ”

Amy looks up from her corner, wet-faced and red-eyed, looking distressed. “Dan—“ she says, desperately. He knows she doesn’t want Cassidy to see her so upset.

“Yeah, yeah.” he reassures her wearily, and goes.

Out in the hallway, Cassie is charging toward their bedroom, and the sight of her bearing down on him in her ladybug pajamas, a tiny little hurricane of fury, actually makes him want to laugh.

“Daddy!” she wails. “We’re going to be _late—!“_

Before she can do anything too drastic, like start flinging herself off the walls or whatever the fuck, Dan intercepts her, sweeping her up off the ground and walking back toward her bedroom. She screeches again and kicks out at him in a frenzy, clearly enraged at his immovable force. 

“Heyyy, Cassie, kiddo.” he greets her mildly, as though this is completely normal behavior, as though everything is completely fine. “What’s up?”

“Where’s Mommy?!“ 

“Mommy’s still getting ready.”

“ _But—_ “ Her voice rises again, high-pitched and furious, and she actually slams her fists against his chest.

“ _Cassie._ ” Dan snaps, more shortly than he intends. “Cut it out, for Christ's sake. You’re not _dying._ ” Normally he takes Cassidy’s dramatics in stride, just like with Amy, but this morning, he’s only got the headspace to handle one Brookheimer losing her shit.

She glowers at him, her blue eyes stormy, clearly seething. “You’re not ready either. No one is ready!”

“I know, I know, honey.” He runs a hand over her messy hair, a technique that normally works to soothe her, and automatically she goes a bit limp against his shoulder, like a wind-up toy. It’s pretty embarrassing how smug he feels about watching her relax, even slightly. He can’t fix Amy, but he _can_ get their kid to calm the fuck down. “It’s _fine,_ it’s not a big deal, I promise. Okay?”

“Okay,” she mumbles, but she glances back over his shoulder toward the master suite, and he knows that she still wants Amy. “Tell Mommy to hurry.”

He deposits Cassie back in her bedroom, mindlessly promising extensive iPad-related rewards if she gets dressed quietly and doesn’t scream again for the next twenty minutes, and then beats it back to the bedroom. Amy’s sitting at her vanity table, shredding a tissue in her hands. She looks more controlled, but still visibly upset, her eyes still glassy with tears.

“So maybe I _did_ manage to fuck some feelings out of you,” he comments, as gently as he can while still trying to make a joke, and Amy lets out this shaky laugh that’s still mostly a sob.

“I fucking hate this,” she mumbles. “I hate it so much.”

“I know, babe.” he sighs. Something about dealing with Cassie has made him finally feel like he can reach for her again, so he does, pulling her to her feet and wrapping his arms around her shoulders. She comes willingly, her cheek pressed to his sternum, and he feels her take a long, shaky inhale, finally relaxing against him. She smells like her shampoo and a little like sex, and something underneath those scents, that undefinable Amy smell, like a residual of her perfume, sweet and sharp at the same time. 

“Do you think…do you I think I can still go to work?” she asks him, almost pathetically hopeful.

Dan smirks down at her ruefully, pushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. “Unfortunately, I think Liz might send you straight back here if you did.”

“Damn it.” she mutters. “The bill—“

“For fuck’s sake, nothing is going to happen to the bill in one afternoon.”

Amy huffs in frustration. “Fine, you win. I’ll stay home. For one day. The morning, at least.” She’s giving in _way_ too easily, and Dan wonders if she really _doesn’t_ feel like working, if she actually thinks hitting the pause button will help her get through this. He doesn’t really give a shit either way (although she does look like she's been crying, and everyone at work would definitely be able to tell, which he knows she wouldn't like). Still...it's  _always_ strange if Amy doesn't want to go to work.

For now, he squeezes her waist and bends his head to murmur seductively in her ear, “I’ll make it up to you later. I’m generous in victory.”

Predictably, she just rolls her eyes in complete and utter disgust. “No, you’re not.” she retorts, a spark of recognizable fire in her skeptical tone. It's stupidly reassuring, Amy calling him out on his bullshit.

“Besides, Ames, you’ve got this _giant_ hickey on your neck—“ he teases, reaching out to run his fingers over the smooth skin of her cheek, down to her jawline, starting to tickle her a bit.

She lets out this comical sort of half-gasp, half-squeal, and pushes him away, darting for her mirror. “Oh my god, _Dan_ _—_ “ she gasps, angling her head. “I am going to murder you, what _the_ hell, you primitive piece-of-shit Neanderthal—“

“ _Whoops,_ ” Dan laughs, shamelessly, and dodges the pillow she throws at him. “You have shit aim, _Ames._ ” 

“Oooh, _funny._ And you’re _so_ late.” she chides him. “Ben is going to be furious.”

“Why do you always act like Ben is the one in charge? He’s not my _boss._ ”

Amy snorts, tossing her hair back. “Please, Dan.” And this is what he wanted, this is where he hoped erotic kitchen sex would take them—back to normal, back to work, Amy facing her shit head on, not running from it. 

Dan grabs his watch off the nightstand, cursing again at the time. Ben is definitively _not_ the boss of him, but he’s still going to be fucking pissed. “I guess I can drop Cassidy on my way into town, I’m late enough, an extra fifteen minutes isn’t going to make a difference.”

“Wait,” Amy commands him. “I want her to stay here today.”

This stops Dan in his tracks. They hardly ever let Cassidy stay home from school.

“What?” he asks her. “Why?”

“Because I want her with me.” Amy tells him flatly, with no room for her argument in her tone--suddenly too cold and icy--and brushes past him into the closet.

“Well…what are you going to tell the school?”

This is not a real objection. They pay that place literally tens of thousands of dollars a year to be able to do whatever they want with Cassidy whenever they feel like it, but Dan feels obscurely like Amy taking a day off by herself and Amy taking a day off with their very exuberant and demanding five year old is not the same thing.

Amy turns back in the doorway to the closet and smiles acidly at him, like she's being poisoned and knows it. “A dead grandfather is a get-out-of-jail-free card, Dan.”

Suddenly, Dan feels like they got nowhere, after all. 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Jonah summons Dan to the White House, and Selina returns. 
> 
> To everyone who has taken the time to comment: thank you from the bottom of my heart. It means so much to know that this story is resonating with some people, and your comments mean more than you know. They are literally inspiration for me to keep writing (especially now that this is officially an AU). You are all amazing and I appreciate every single one of you. xx - safflowerseason.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back to my epic love-letter to the old Veep of yore. 
> 
> To briefly recap the prologue: in this story’s timeline, Selina ran against Montez and lost—hilarious that the show briefly dangled that possibility in front of us—and Amy and BKD worked for her until the bitter end. It does not take any of season seven into account, although I have been inspired by certain elements of the season, if that makes sense.

* * *

And I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine.

it's not a problem,

it's just a challenge,

it's a challenge to resist temptation.

\- jason robert brown, the last five years

* * *

 

 _April, 2021 - five months after the November 2020 election_  

The minute Dan receives the confirmation email in his inbox, he calls Amy.

 “What do you want, Dan, I’m fucking knee-deep in intelligence briefings—“

 "I’m going to text you an address and I want you to meet me there on your lunch break.”

 “…Why?”

 “It’s a surprise.”

 “Then abso-fucking-lutely not.”

 “Trust me, it’s the good kind of surprise.”

 “Last time you said that it turned out you didn’t have any condoms in your apartment.”

 “And look how well that turned out.”

 “Dan, I wasn’t even planning on taking a lunch break today…”

 “You’re not working for Selina anymore, you can take one fucking hour. And bring Cassie with you.”

 “She’s at daycare.”

 “So? I’m not subsidizing the most exclusive daycare in the city so we can’t check her out whenever we want.”

 “It’s disruptive.”

 “Yeah, _this_ is the disruptive thing about her life.”

 “Dan—“

 “She’s one-and-a-half and can’t remember what happens from one minute to the next. Bring her.”

 “Ugh, _fine._ Any other demands?”

 “Uh, yeah, remind me what you’re wearing again?”

 Amy just hangs up on him, which is how Dan knows she’ll be there. 

 

* * *

 

It’s a gorgeous spring day, the first day you can really be outside without a coat (Dan left his back at the office), breezy and warm without the slightest chill. The street’s all decked out in bright pastels—blossoming trees tinted in soft greens and pinks, blue refracting in the evaporating puddles from yesterday’s rain, little sapphire chips mirroring the sky. Yellow and red brick houses peek out from the exploding greenery; the house behind Dan stands the tallest on the block, with a budding maple tree just brushing up against the front wall.

Not that Dan cares about any of that bullshit except insofar as it makes _him_ look irresistible (the scene would be a _great_ magazine cover, he thinks). He sits on the front steps to wait for Amy, mentally betting himself on how long it will take her to show up.

Eventually, her car appears at the end of the street, and even before she parks, Dan can see her actively trying not to look too intrigued at the scene. She spends an inordinate amount of time getting Cassie out of her car seat, and Dan can hear her rambling away in her usual business-like tone—both of them speak to the kid like she’s a fully grown adult, not a toddler just barely beginning to understand human language. Underneath her voice, he can still pick up the high-pitched, delighted stream of Cassidy’s constant toddler babble.

To his pleasure, Amy’s wearing a dark pink, almost magenta-colored dress, with billowing sleeves and overlapping swathes of fabric in different shades hugging her hips and waist. Dan specifically put Cassie in a pale lavender outfit this morning, on the off-chance he got the email he was eagerly waiting for, so with him in his usual blue suit, it’d be harder for them to look any more coordinated if they tried.

Amy approaches him slowly, Cassie balanced on her hip, both of them staring at up at the three-story brick house behind him with their identical wide blue eyes. But only one pair narrows at him in suspicion.

“What _is_ this?” she demands. “What the fuck is this house? Are you showing me where you keep your fucking harem? Trying to rope me into a lunch-time orgy?”

“I wouldn’t have you bring Cassidy for that, don’t be fucking _gross_ , Amy.” Dan counters. “And that’s scheduled for next week, anyway.” 

“Cassie orgy!” Cassidy giggles, and claps her hands. She’s been in a mimicking mode recently, repeating everything verbatim that she hears from her parents or the TV. It’s a pretty funny habit, and in Dan’s opinion, clearly constitutes evidence of her profound genius.

“Besides,” Dan adds, and looks her up and down, his eyes lingering on her curves. “I’m still tired out from this morning.” 

Amy blushes and looks away. Her obsessive insistence on denying any sort of relationship between the two of them would be a lot more fucking convincing if she didn’t jump him every time she got the chance. And if they weren’t currently shacked up in her old apartment.

“Then…what?”

“It’s about to go on the market.” Dan informs her, and watches her face closely. Amy just looks confused.

“So? Are you buying a house?”

“Well no, we’d both buy it. I’m not letting you fucking freeload off me, Brookheimer.”

 _Finally_ she gets it, and her mouth drops open in genuine surprise. “You want us to _move_ in here?”

“If you like it, yeah.”

“…why?”

Dan sighs in exasperation. “Because if I have to spend another month sharing the world’s smallest bathroom with the most uptight-control-bitch-OCD roommate to ever grace the goddamn earth, I’m going to fucking murder you, Psycho-style in the shower.”

Amy bristles like an angry cat, practically expanding with indignation. “Maybe if _my_ roommate weren’t a complete fucking slob and not fatally addicted to over-priced hair products, there’d be more fucking room in the bathroom.” 

“Maybe _my_ roommate should think about what happens when _our_ kid needs her own bathroom.” 

Amy opens her mouth furiously, and then closes it again.

“ _Bash-room._ ” Cassidy repeats tentatively into the silence, picking up on the tension between her parents. 

“She’s not that big yet.” Amy finally says into the silence, running a hand over Cassidy’s thick mop of hair, and there’s something in her face that Dan can’t entirely read—like she’s already nostalgic, maybe, for that first year of Cassie’s life when she was so tiny and portable and Amy could just tote her around everywhere like a very large football. (For his part, Dan can’t fucking _wait_ for Cassie to keep growing, he was over the whole diapers and strollers and baby-carrier nightmare in his first twenty-four hours as a father.)

“She’s gonna get bigger and I’m fucking tired of the three of us tripping over each other’s shit in that tiny box you call an apartment. And even if she inherited your fucking doll-size height genes, it’s still going to be too small.”

Amy bites her lip, her eyes back on the house, but he can tell she’s not really looking at it, too wrapped up in her own internal debate with herself.

Dan steps closer, so that she’s forced to look up at him. “Come on, Amy.” he begins again, in a lower voice. “It’s been months since the election, we can fucking make some moves now. You have Liz, BKD’s killing it… 

Amy makes the little involuntary twitching movement with her head that she always does whenever he mentions 2020. But then she nods, slowly. “The lease on my place is up in May.” she admits.

Dan surprises himself by letting out his own breath. It’s always risky to mention the election around Amy, the last month of which had been a shitshow of truly epic proportions, of which Amy had, of course, borne the brunt. 

“That’s the spirit, Ames.” He starts ushering her closer to the front steps. “Wait till you see the bathrooms, the amount of space is going to be such a fucking turn-on.”

That stops her in her tracks. “You’ve already _been_ here? You said it wasn’t even on the market!”

“I have an in with the realtor.” Dan informs her smugly.

“I fucking figured.” Amy mutters under her breath. “Some ex-congressional aide you used to fuck?”

“Not that kind of in. Her granddaughter is also in Cassie’s daycare. If you ever paid attention to that chart I made you, you wouldn’t be so fucking surprised.”

Amy rolls her eyes. “So you manipulated some nice old lady into giving you insider real-estate tips. I don’t need your psycho-stalker chart to tell me that, Dan.”

“It’s not my fault I’m so popular at daycare.” Dan says, and almost manages to say it with a straight face. Even Amy can’t resist her automatic impulse to smirk back at him, although she fights it hard. “Oh, that reminds me, you’ll need this for when she comes.”

He shoves his hand into his pocket for the ring he picked up this morning. Amy’s studying the exterior of the house more closely now, checking out the butterfly bushes that cluster below the front windows, so Dan has the advantage of her distracted focus. He’s got the ring on almost all the way before she notices what he’s doing. 

“What are you—oh my _fucking_ god, what in the sociopathic name of sacred shit are you— _oh_ …” And she actually gasps, her voice trailing away as she takes in the ring, and if possible, her eyes get even bigger. The ring is simple but eye-catching, a thin gold band embedded with tiny stones and topped with a single large, cushion-cut diamond. Dan was in and out of the store in less than five minutes, and seeing her reaction, he _clearly_ got it exactly right. He’s already mentally patting himself on the back for being such a fucking genius with jewelry.

Amy raises her eyes to his again, and the fact that she hasn’t already taken the ring off and thrown it at his face means this whole gamble is already a _wild_ success. Dan can’t stop grinning at her. Damn, he’s so brilliant, he deserves all the fucking awards 

“Okay, you goddamned knock-off Ponzi-scheming fuckface. This is the most fucking suspicious thing you’ve ever done, and I know this is _not_ a proposal, so what the hell?!”

“What?!” he replies, defensively, trying to look as innocent as possible. “It’s a competitive market, Amy—we have to make the owners _want_ to sell us the house more than anyone else.” 

“Half the houses sold in this town are politicians setting up local fuck-nests for their overpriced mistresses. We do not need to pretend to be fucking _engaged_.”

“Trust me, when you see the master suite, you’d fucking marry me _tomorrow_ if you think it will increase our chances.”

Amy actually laughs, then, and while it’s mostly scornful, Dan thinks he can detect an undercurrent of genuine, unbridled happiness underneath. “Do you think the prospect of living in a stupid house will somehow cause me to lose all my fucking brain cells, Dan? I don’t give a shit how big the master bedroom is.”

Cassie makes a sudden swipe at the ring on her mother’s hand. Dan laughs. “No, you little magpie, that’s for your mom.”

“I want!” she demands clearly, pointing at the ring. Amy’s gone back staring at her hand in complete disbelief, like she can’t fucking believe there’s an actual ring on there. Since she’s clearly still distracted, Dan takes Cassidy from her loose grip and swings her up in the air, making exaggerated greeting noises, and Cassidy laughs at him and kicks her little feet in joy. Having a kid is fan-fucking-tastic for his ego, that’s for sure, Cassidy is literally  _always_ happy to see him, it makes up for the fucking gross monotony of the whole baby thing, that’s for certain.

“Is this even a real ring?” Amy demands.

“Relax, I’ll take it back once we’ve seen the house.”

“Oh, _well_ then.” she snarks, and he can see she doesn’t quite like that idea either, as much as she’s trying to pretend she totally hates the ring. 

“Or…” he proposes, and for the first time he does look away from her to Cassie, who has turned her focus to his cufflinks. Shit, she’s already developing a taste for expensive shiny things. “…you can keep it on to look at another house. The realtor said there was another one closer to the river that we might like too."

He only looks back up at her when enough time has passed that he won’t have to see her initial reaction, in case it’s not what he wants to see. Amy’s got the ring-less hand propped against her waist, staring at him with narrowed eyes. Suddenly, she exhales in relief, like she’s figured out everything out. “You’ve got, like, five houses lined up for us to look at, haven’t you, Dan?”

Dan shrugs. “Well, I’m bored of waiting for you to let go of…whatever fucking neuroses you’re not letting go.”

“Fucking _newoses._ ” Cassidy agrees.

“Shhh, don’t say _fucking_ in front of the realtor, Cass.” Dan instructs her automatically. 

“Shhh!” she echoes up at him.

“Good girl.”

Watching them, Amy seems to make up her mind.

“Ugh, give her to me.” she demands, and holds out her arms. “If this realtor is such a damn dinosaur that she needs to think we actually fucking like each other, she’ll want to see me holding our kid, not you. We probably shouldn’t even tell her I have a real job.”

Dan smirks. “So you’re keeping the ring on, then.”

“Only until the end of the afternoon.”Amy tells him haughtily. “I’m fucking tired of you taking up all the space in my closet.”

In the end, Amy insists on seeing all five houses. After a prolonged argument that night involving multiple bribes both sexual and political in nature, they decide to go with that first one. On purpose, Dan doesn’t mention the ring again; on purpose, Amy forgets to take it off.

 

* * *

 

_Present_

 “Wait…Mommy’s staying home from work?” Cassidy says, in complete disbelief. She looks suspiciously up at Dan and Amy, standing in the doorway to her bedroom. Everyone is still half-dressed: Dan’s shirt halfway unbuttoned, Amy’s still in her (now tightly knotted) dressing gown, and Cassidy’s wearing her favorite blue Penn sweatshirt that clashes terribly with her ladybug pajamas.

It looks like she changed her mind halfway through getting dressed and decided to tear apart her bedroom in retaliation for her parents for making her late for school. The bedclothes are all twisted and in complete disarray, stuffed animals and books scattered everywhere, all the pillows lying on the floor. Richard the lobster is perched on top of the armchair in the corner, eyeing the scene with a sardonic expression in his black, beady eyes.

“Uh huh, so we get to have a fun mother-daughter day!” Amy says, clearly trying to sound perky and upbeat, like all the stay-at-home mothers at Cassidy’s school, with their mommy blogs and home-cooked meals and stylish athleisure wear. It’s pretty fucking hilarious how bad she is at it. She actually _claps_ her hands. Dan has to stuff a fist in his mouth to keep from laughing.

Cassie just stares at her mother uncomprehendingly, like she’s been abducted by aliens. “…what?” she says, as though maybe she’s missed a joke at her expense.

Amy sighs and her face and voice immediately go back to normal. “Cassie, I’m just working from home today. Do you want to stay home with me?”

“Oh.” Cassie says, like _why didn’t you say that before, silly._ “Yes, yes, yes, I do!” she exclaims then, suddenly transported with glee. “Can I wear my pajamas all day? Like you?”

“You can do whatever you want.”

“TV!” she exclaims, grabs Richard, and darts past both her parents into the hallway.

“Shut the fuck up.” Amy mutters, right as Dan opens his mouth to tease her about her terrible Stepford wife impression, and she shoves him back as she goes to follow Cassidy.

Dan finishes getting ready as fast as possible, which even at high-speed takes at least twenty-five more minutes, and by the time he makes it back downstairs, Cassie and Amy are already halfway through breakfast, Amy on her laptop and absently feeding herself toast one-handed, Cassidy munching away on some granola and engrossed in a nature documentary about the Amazon on the Discovery Channel. He leaves them there, stealing a piece of Amy’s toast on the way out, and they both barely pay him any attention.

It feels weird to leave them behind on his way to work, weird to head out on his own without them. Usually their morning routine involves all three of them charging out of the house at the same time, Cassie off to school to learn how to count and share and manipulate her classmates on the playground, Dan and Amy off to work to tear shit up on the Hill.

It’s like he’s temporarily fallen into a different dimension of his life, like Amy is some vapid daughter-of-a-judge or ex-model he accidentally knocked up and had to marry, who spent her days going to the gym or planning mindless charity fundraisers, with nothing to show for her efforts except Botox receipts and credit card bills. Dan had gone back and forth on whether or not that kind of future was what he wanted. He had been so obsessively careful to avoid it back when they were in Selina’s veep office and he spent his free time fucking his way through the network of well-connected congressional daughters. The social stakes had always seemed a bit too high.

But then, in New York, working for CBS and surrounded by gorgeous, equally narcissistic women who worked in media, he thought it might not be so bad, to get married and share a life with someone…when he was fifty-five and finally ready to settle down with some nice twenty-three year old who only wanted his money and his dick and to whom he would never have to pay much serious attention.

And instead, against all the fucking odds, he ended up with Amy Brookheimer. Amy, who wanted power as badly as he did, who saw right through him to the fucking rotten core, and who expected nothing and everything from him. And instead, hehad been the one who convinced her to buy a house together, who had the idea to get married on a whim in New Hampshire, who ultimately refused to back out of the picture.

Dan never tries to dwell too much on this unsettling reversal of fate—yeah, he had to actually _try_ with her, but Amy also had never, _ever_ wanted anyone the way she wanted him, so he figures they’re fucking even.

Amy had wanted him in spite of everyone, in spite of her own judgement, in spite of her fucking father, the father who spent the last five years of his life prophesying that the man she chose was planning to screw her and their daughter over the first real chance he got. And Dan doesn’t…he doesn’t need or _want_ to think about how emphatically he’s done the _exact_ fucking opposite, how he fucking threw himself into a new life and hardly stopped to look back.

The past version of Dan who schemed his way into Selina’s office by dumping Carol Hallowes, who dated women solely for political intel or job opportunities and who fucked Amy’s own sister for a job, he wouldn’t have believed any of this morning’s scene. He would have been fucking horrified at all the ways Dan’s found himself inextricably tied to two living, breathing humans, the woman and the girl he just left behind.

 _What the everloving fuck._ Dan slams his hands on the steering wheel in exasperation with himself. Just because Amy’s trapped in some self-flagellating mind-fuck of feelings because of her dad died didn’t mean he had to trap himself in there with her.

To shake his unease, he spends the rest of the drive reliving their glorious morning fuck-fest against the refrigerator (Past-Dan would have approved of that much, at least), and how insanely fucking hot it was when Amy insisted on watching him as he pushed into her, how the contrast between her hot, wet cunt and the cool aluminum merely intensified every single tantalizing sensation, and that high-pitched, desperate gasp she let out when she came around his dick…yeah, they’re definitely doing _that_ again, as soon as he can arrange it.

Ben and Kent are both waiting for him in his office when he finally gets into work, even later than he expected (the drizzle from early this morning has turned into a full-fledged downpour, which has fucked up all the downtown traffic.)

“You’re late.” Kent says.

“Dead father-in-law card.” Dan tells him shortly, slinging off his bag. There’s no way he’s getting into the details of this morning with Ben and Kent.

Ben snorts. “ _You_ don’t get one of those, Danny-boy.” 

“Jonah called.” Kent adds. “He wants you over at the White House this morning to talk about the healthcare bill. So he can ‘decide’ what to do if it passes.”

“When it passes.” Dan corrects him, rubbing a hand over his face. He needs coffee, badly. “And fucking _no,_ I’m not going.”

“Everyone’s going, Dan, and he asked for you and Amy specifically. Last I checked the count is still 54-46, and that’s not veto-proof. And we can’t afford to lose Liz as a client. So get the fuck to work.”

“Jonah wants to see everyone at eleven.” Kent says helpfully. “So…you’ve got like forty-five minutes before you have to leave. Traffic is backed up for a mile, what with the rain and Jonah’s morning visit to a local community garden in Mount Pleasant.”

“He did that on fucking purpose.” Dan mutters. “That overgrown praying mantis never does presidential shit like this unless he can fuck up a day’s worth of business.” 

“Are you new here?” Ben asks him. “Of course he did that shit on fucking purpose.”

“Is Liz at least sending a car?"

“No.” Ben replies, smugly. “Who exactly do you think you are?”

“Okay, can we _please_ revisit the company car service thing?” Dan whines at them both. “We have the fucking money.”

“It’s bad for the environment.” Kent informs him haughtily. “And I’m trying to increase our Green-Building certification with the city.”

“And we’d miss all the fun of you whining about it.” Ben smirks.

“I can’t wait until you both fucking flatline.” Dan mumbles.

 

* * *

 

Dan gets to the White House right at eleven (he’s not really _trying_ that hard to make it on time). Right away, he knows the rest of the morning is going to be a fucking disaster. When he checks in at security, he has to undergo a full body search because there’s a “problem” with his security clearance. Then, when he finally makes it to the Oval and the main secretary calls in with his name, instead of being allowed to pass through, Richard comes out the doors.

“Good morning, Dan.” he says, all bright and chipper. Of the two of them, Amy’s the one who’d bury Richard alive in the ground no questions asked, but this morning, Dan fucking _cannot_ with  the whole aw-shucks-thanks-ma’am-cornfed-Iowa-boy schtick. “Is it still raining? You look a little damp.”

“Can I not go in?’’

“Unfortunately, President Ryan has a strict attendance policy with his meetings, and you arrived late, so—“

“You have got to be fucking kidding me.” Dan interrupts him furiously. “That ass-clown has never been on time to anything in his entire toxic waste dump of a political career. They had to delay his inauguration by an _hour_ because he overslept.”

“Regardless, sir, President Ryan says you have to wait for ten extra minutes before you can come in. He said to tell you specifically that you should think of it as a ‘time-out.’ ” Richard makes an apologetic face. “He also said to tell you that if you try to force your way past me, the Secret Service will, and I quote, ‘trap you in a choke-hold so intense that your stupid bone structure will never—“

“Jesus _fucking_ Christ.” Dan says and throws himself back his chair. “Fine, whatever.”

“I can keep you company, though.” Richard adds, all bright and chipper, like maybe his presence will _just_ somehow salvage Dan’s morning. _“_ Can I get you a water, or some other beverage?”

“I need a shot of whiskey,”

Richard laughs. “Oh, according to Splett family rules, we’re not allowed to touch alcohol before five o’clock in the evening, because that’s when we bring in the livestock from the—“

“Oh my fucking god, shut _up_. Get me a water. And some of those White House M&M’s.”

“Good idea, that will put you in a better mood for the meeting, it seems like your blood sugar might be a little low. I didn’t know you had a sweet tooth, Mr. Egan—“

“Not for me, for my daughter, you broken-down Cabbage Patch—“

“Oh, right, for Miss Cassidy!” Richard always refers to Cassie as “Miss Cassidy”, because Dan suspects his brain just replays _The Music Man_ in a permanent loop and that’s why he consistently speaks like he’s stuck in River City circa 1912. “Is she enjoying kindergarten?”

“Richard, if you don’t want the fucking Secret Service to bust in here right now and make a real mess outside the Oval Office, stop talking.”

“Right-o.” Richard agrees, and busies himself with fetching the M&M’s.

 Dan’s been in the Oval Office a few times since Jonah was elected (their new president liked thinking up bullshit reasons to have meetings with people who thought he was never going to win). And every damn time he walks in, his brain has to fucking scramble and rewind in order to process (and re-process) the visual of Jonah Ryan, physical proof of what happens when a human fucks a Wookiee, holding court at the Resolute Desk. There’s just no words in the fucking universe to describe how truly unbelievable it is. For fuck’s sake, Jonah used to work out of that tiny-ass supply closet just a few corridors away—Dan used to steal paper clips from there just to piss him off.

This morning, Jonah’s got his giant alien legs kicked up, so long they practically hang over the far end of the desk. The fake glasses he wears as part of his “presidential” look are cast aside and the knot in his tie is crooked. How the fuck has he not been able to find a better tailor, that’s Dan’s real question.

On the assorted couches and armchairs sit assorted senators and congressmen associated with the _Halliday-McClain Accessible Health Care Reform Act_ , Liz and her co-sponsor among them. Liz has a look in her eyes like she’s two fucking seconds away from shooting Jonah in the face right in front of the Secret Service, and only her elite military training is holding her back. Then again, it’s the same expression that the Secret Service wear around Jonah, so maybe they’re not flagging it as a threat.

Seated a little apart from the group is Shawnee Tanz. She smiles at Dan as he walks in (it’s very ominous).

“Dan.” Jonah announces, loudly. “You’re fucking late. Have you no respect for the office of the President?!”

Dan takes a seat next to Liz without saying, grinding his teeth. There’s no point trying to respond.

“Wait…” Jonah squints. “Where’s Amy? Why isn’t she here?”

Dan knows better than to look at Liz, who presumably did _not_ tell Jonah that Amy wouldn’t be coming at all. Liz’s general policy when she’s around Jonah is to pretend he doesn’t exist, even when she’s having meetings with him.

“She’s not coming.” Liz says crisply. “I thought her time would be better spent elsewhere.”

Predictably, the insult flies right over Jonah’s head. “Ooh, trouble in paradise, Dan? The spark’s finally gone away?”

Dan briefly envisions all the creative ways Amy would murder him if he bragged to Jonah about their fantastically hot sex up against the refrigerator this morning in front of her boss and a room full of senators. He considers doing it anyway, just to rub it in Jonah’s face.

“No.” He just says instead, but he smirks very faintly as he says it, and Jonah’s expression immediately darkens. Ha. Let him obsess over that for the rest of the fucking meeting.

“If we could return to the matter at hand,” Senator McClain says impatiently. “Mr. President, I really _cannot_ overstate the sheer…stupidity of vetoing a bill that garners so much overwhelming support—“

Shawnee speaks smoothly from her corner. “Our polling indicates that a sizeable percentage of President Ryan’s baseline voters actually don’t rank health-care very highly as an issue of interest.” 

“Polling where, Jonah’s twitter replies?” Dan mumbles. Liz bites her lip to keep from smirking, and turns away from him to address Jonah.

“If you could put aside your own impossibly pointless political grudges aside, Jonah, I think you’d see in the long-run that not vetoing the bill would actually do a lot more for your political career.”

The meeting basically goes on like that—adults speaking to the fucking President of the United States the way they speak to their young children—and Dan stops paying attention, because everyone in the room knows that Jonah is probably going to the veto the bill out of spite and because the woman he’s currently fucking wants him to. If things keep going in this direction, Dan’s going to have to find Jonah a new fucking girlfriend. At least Kent’s already got files from his and Ben’s last disastrous attempt.

His phone vibrates in his hand. A text from Amy—two pictures of Cassie, in her little red raincoat and rubber boots, peeking up over the railing at the Waterfront Park and nose to nose with a startled-looking goose. A third photo appears: a blurred selfie of the two of them, with the grey river in the background.

 _We were restless,_ Amy writes, the bubble popping up underneath the photos. Dan smiles to himself and texts back: _watch out. geese are dangerous, Ames._

Her answer comes back almost immediately.

_Wait are you afraid of geese, Dan?_

_No comment._

_Hahahaha this is perfect news._

And then, predictably: _what’s happening at work?_

“Dan! _”_ Jonah’s stupid voice breaks through “Fucking hello! Is there something you would like to share with the rest of the class?”

Whatever’s left of his patience neatly snaps in half. “Yes, actually. Amy says you’re nothing but a black-market full-body reconstructive surgical experiment gone wrong who has no business making decisions on anything, and if the Founding Fathers knew you would one day be elected, they would fucking beg for a constitutional amendment invalidating all of Article II.”

The meeting goes downhill from there.

 

* * *

 

Liz insists that Dan drive back with her to the Russell Building once Jonah throws them all out of the Oval in a fit of rage. They’re exiting the West Wing when Shawnee silently catches up to them. Dan wouldn’t put it past her, fucking witch-lady, to have somehow learned how to magically appear and disappear at will.

“It’s too bad you blew up the meeting, Mr. Egan. President Ryan was really looking forward to clearing up some of his questions about the long-term effects of this legislation.”

Dan just snorts. “Nice attempt at spin control, but that’s a no-fucking-go. You say to any reporter within a twenty-mile radius and I’ll leak that Jonah threatened a civilian with Secret Service retaliation just for showing up on time to a meeting.”

Shawnee just smiles serenely at him. “You might do that anyway—it might help with his base."

“That woman is fucking psychopath.” Dan comments Liz, once they’re in the car.

“Mmm.” she just says, and looks at him like she’s not sure whether he’s telling a joke or not.

“How worried should we be about the bill?”

They spend the car ride re-litigating their bill strategy, for what feels like the thousandth fucking time (Dan’s getting pretty bored of it). When they pull up in front of the Russell Building, Liz gets out first, signals to her entourage in the car behind them to keep back for a second.

“You know,” she says, conversationally. “Amy’s actually quite young to lose her father.”

Dan glances up from his phone. “…what?”

Liz looks skyward like she’s seeking internal strength. “I’m just saying, you emotionally incompetent nitwit, that on the whole most women her age do not expect the death of a parent. My father is eighty-nine, and I still don’t expect him to die for at least another year or two. How old is your father?”

When Dan just stares at her blankly, she snorts a little in laughter. “Never mind. The point is: when my husband’s father died, he said it changed his whole fucking life in ways he couldn’t even predict. It didn’t go away overnight. And I think it will be even more true for Amy.”

Dan’s brain skids over her words like a car over black ice, barely catching any traction. She’s just voiced, directly to his fucking face, all his worst fears from this morning, watching Amy beat herself up over the death of her father in ways he didn’t know was possible. Jesus, he doesn’t want anything about Amy, or anything about their life, to change permanently.

“Amy will be fine.” he finally manages to respond, and he hates how defensive he sounds. “She’s just…dealing.”

Liz shrugs. “I’m sure she is. And I’m saying she’s going to have to deal with it longer than you might think.”

And with that, she sets off with the rest of her entourage, leaving Dan behind, so thrown-off by the entire surreal conversation that he forgets to be pissed that she drove him all the way out to the Senate offices just to dump him on the front steps of the Russell Building. 

He doesn’t feel like rushing back to work and explaining to Ben and Kent how fucked they are with the bill. Instead, he buys a coffee from the cart on the corner of C Street and Delaware and then wanders mindlessly through the Senate Office Park, ignorant of the persistent drizzle that’s threatening to ruin his sixth-best work suit and his fourth-best pair of shoes, and trying not to think about what Liz said.

When his phone rings, he answers it mindlessly, without checking the screen.

He regrets it immediately.

“Dan!” shrills his mother’s voice. “I’ve been trying to call you for three days now!”

Reflexively, Dan yanks the phone away from his face, furiously mutters “ _Shit!”_ at the sky, before wearily pushing it back up to his ear.

“Uh, you have?” he asks. “That’s so weird, Mother, maybe the calls are getting dropped…”

Dan’s parents usually spent November through April shuttling around the Caribbean on a variety of cruise ships, occasionally settling down in some luxury bungalow for a few weeks at a time before hopping on to the next island. He never bothers to keep track of where they are, so right now the fact that they could be as far as fucking Curaçao for all he knows affords him good enough cover to pretend that he hasn’t been actively ignoring his mother’s calls.

His mother steamrolls right over that excuse, though. “Why on _earth_ didn’t you call me the minute you learned about Amy’s father! The poor darling. How _terrible_ it must be for her.” Dan imagines Amy’s face if she ever heard his mother calling her a poor darling, and has to fight the urge to laugh. “It must have been so sudden, you hadn’t mentioned anything about his health recently… 

Dan does his mother the courtesy of allowing her to pretend that he has ever in his life given her an update on the health ofany of the Brookheimers. “Yeah, it was unexpected. His heart, I think, just gave out.”

 _But it wasn’t unexpected,_ comes a little unwelcome nagging voice at the back of his head, and on its heels, the memory of Sophie’s oldest kid, going off at the mall… _Mom totally knew this was coming. She told me._ Shit, he had completely forgotten about that whole landmine, the possibility that Sophie and Mrs. Brookheimer hadn’t told Amy how serious things were with her father’s health. Jesus. He’s been actively trying to forget he heard anything about it. Amy’s already enough of a mess. 

There’s a sad sigh at the other end of the phone. “I keep telling your father to give up red meat. And those cigars of his…such a bad habit.” 

“Good fucking luck,” Dan mutters under his breath. “Wait, Mom…how did you even find out?”

“Facebook, of course, Dan.”

Fucking Facebook.

Amy and Dan had put off, as long as possible, the inevitable meeting of the Brookheimers and the Egans. They had made it until Christmas of 2022, when Cassidy was three.

For Christmas 2021, they had fucked off from all family commitments, citing the “new” house as a reason. They stayed in bed all day, ordered in Thai, watched Cassidy tear around with her new toys until she passed out early, at which point they put her to bed and spent the rest of the night in varying states of undress while strategizing for the new year. Dan looks back on that day with a fondness that is, frankly, fucking embarrassing.

But to make up for blowing off their families, they had to sit through a fucking _interminable_ Christmas dinner with both sets of parents the following year (Dan’s brother and sister, mercifully, were not present). Sophie brought her latest garbage boyfriend in addition to all three kids. Dan’s dad barely said two words the entire evening yet somehow still managed to convey his disapproval of the entire arrangement. One of Sophie’s kids spilled something on Mr. Brookheimer’s sleeve and it caught fire during dessert. And they were driving home that same night, so Dan couldn’t even drink his way through the evening.   

By far the most excruciating outcome of that excruciating five hours was the fact that Mrs. Brookheimer and Mrs. Egan had actually, unbelievably, _horrifically_ , hit it off. They became Facebook friends, like all retired mothers over the age of fifty, and Dan was vaguely aware that they exchanged Christmas and birthday cards and emailed occasionally. He’s pretty sure that half his mother’s updates on Cassidy come from Mrs. Brookheimer, not from him.

It had never occurred to Dan to tell his mother about Amy’s dad, and he had totally spaced on the fact that she now had other sources for Brookheimer-related information.

“Dan? Dan? Are you listening?”

“Uh, yeah, what did you say?”

“How is Cassidy? I know she and Amy’s parents are close.”

“She’s fine, Mom. She’s five.”

His mother tsks at him. “Oh honey, you have no idea how much children pick up at that age. Make sure to spend some extra time with her during the next few weeks, okay?”

“Mmhm.” He’s gone back to thinking about the meeting with Jonah. Liz has probably updated her by now on what happened, which means Amy’s rainy-day adventures with Cassie have been interrupted.

“Well, I’m calling to tell you that of course we’ll be coming to Washington for the funeral, and so we’ll have to make plans—" 

“Wait, _what_?!”

Fuck, fuck, fuck, _no,_ this cannot be fucking happening. Dan can barely stand being around his parents when things are going swimmingly. The idea of dealing with them on top of the tsunami of professional and personal shit he’s wading through right now is fucking horrifying.

“We’re coming for the funeral, Dan.” his mother insists, an arch little note in her voice now, like she’s picking up on his less-than-thrilled even thousands and thousands of miles away. “Anne’s already posted the details, and I’ve just emailed her to tell her we’ll be in attendance. Family supports family.”

Dan refrains from blurting out that if it weren’t for Cassidy, his mother would hear even _less_ from him than she does now, and he currently averages about five phone calls a year. And also, since fucking _when_ had the date been actually finalized for the funeral?! Amy had conveniently forgotten to mention that little fact to him sometime in the past few days. Jesus. 

“Mom, you absolutely do _not_ have to come, Amy doesn’t expect you to interrupt your trip—“ And now he’s picturing Amy’s face when she hears the news that she’ll have to deal with his parents on top of her own batshit family, and he literally almost shudders. On top of that, there’s his own father’s complete lack of interest in the Brookheimers (not to mention his own children), seeing as they weren’t members of his tony country club in Albany, and that was sure to manifest itself in a general derision for the entire affair.

“Nonsense. Amy is part of the family now, and so are her mother and her sister. And your father would like to see Cassidy again. We have a present for her from Barbados.”

“What the hell kind of present did you pick up for a five-year-old in Barbados? A bottle of rum?” 

“Don’t be ridiculous, Danny.”

“Well, you can’t stay with us. It’s just super busy with work right now, and Amy has all this family coming into town already…and we don’t have any room, anyway.” Thank Christ he and Amy are too fucking lazy to do anything with the third floor of the house, so they never have to entertain house guests.

“We’ll stay at the Sofitel, as usual. That way we can come for a whole week. I’ve heard the cherry blossoms are out.”

“ _Great._ ” mutters Dan through gritted teeth. A whole fucking week of squiring his mother around Washington while she obsesses over Cassidy’s appearance and his father makes pointed comments over dinner about how unimpressed he is with his offspring and their children. “Fantastic, Mother.”

“Perfect.” His mother sounds extraordinarily pleased with herself on the other end of the line. “Now, what kind of flowers do Amy and her mother like?”

“Peonies.” Dan lies shamelessly, and hangs up.

 

* * *

 

He spends the rest of the afternoon making a last-ditch effort on the override strategy for the bill, calling in every single lobbyist friend for intel and throwing any and all leverage against every senator he can think of. To no fucking avail.

Ben and Kent are both caught up in other things, so he blows off a drinks meeting with a PKM connection (once again using Amy’s dad as an excuse, because if she won’t he might as well get some mileage out of this mess), and decides to head home early.

When he walks through the front door, the first thing he hears is Amy yelling at someone on her phone. The sound is such a fucking relief that he actually leans back against the front door, shuts his eyes, and just lets it wash over him for a second. (But only for a second.)

 _Please, feel better,_ he thinks to himself. She’s got to be feeling a little better. They had cathartic angry grief sex and fought about her dad, which are really the only contributions he can make to the grieving process, and she spent the day with Cassie and they went for a walk in the rain with Cassie and some of it _has_ to have helped her. It’s just sinking in now, with Amy’s voice crashing over him, just how off he’s felt today, knowing she was here and still struggling with whatever fucking delusions of guilt her grief-wracked brain is throwing at her. Even though he objected to it at first, he’s glad Cassidy was with her all day. And that conversation with Liz didn’t help either, Jesus.

Eventually, Dan traces the uproar to the dining room, where Amy is pacing back and forth in front of the French windows. Whatever’s going on in her head, she at least _looks_ back to normal, her expression as stormy as the weather outside and her face as red as the cashmere sweater she’s wearing. A severely marked up copy of the health-care bill is spread out in sections over the entire dining room table. Underneath it, on the expensive Holland & Sherry rug that Gary chose because it apparently complemented the oak flooring (or something, Dan wasn’t fucking paying attention), Cassie’s lying on her stomach and flipping through what looks like a very thick dictionary.

“I don’t fucking care if you think Ronnie is _the one,_ his name is not going in the obituary, Jesus fucking Christ.” Amy hisses. She’s got that bug-eyed, lock-jawed look she used to get back in Selina’s office, when nobody was listening to her. “You’ve been dating for four weeks, he met Dad _one_ time.” 

On the other end of line, there’s a high-pitched stream of invective, so loud that even Dan can hear it. He sinks heavily into a chair and picks up the nearest stack of papers, flipping through them idly (Subtitle C, Part 3, Sect. 2901, tax relief for veterans).

“Dan gets to be in it over my strenuous objections. You think I want everyone who reads the fucking _Philadelphia Inquirer_ to know that I’m fucking legally bound to him?”

“Hey,” Dan interrupts lazily, even though obviously he doesn’t give a fuck about the obituary. Amy whirls in surprise, and then glares at the sight of him ruffling through her precious stacks of paper. “That’s only like five people anyway, Ames.”

“Those five people and everyone in Aunt Susan’s fucking book club.” Amy mutters, before turning her attention back to her sister. “Sophie, I don’t have fucking time to argue the point anymore. By all means, marry Ronnie tomorrow, or better yet, why don’t you wear white to the fucking funeral and say your vows on Dad’s freshly turned grave, that wouldn’t give Mom a conniption fit or anything."

She cuts the call and hurls the phone down onto the rug.

“Bye, Aunt Sophie.” Cassidy’s disembodied voice chirps cheerfully from beneath the table. Amy put her hands over her face and attempts to take a deep calming breath, but instead she just lets out a strangled groan of rage.

“So, did you have a nice day, _sweetie_?” Dan asks her, putting his legs up on the chair next to his. For Amy’s benefit, he gets his most obnoxious smirk in place. “Because my day was pretty damn shitty.”

“Why the _fuck_ didn’t you call me about the Jonah meeting the second you heard it was happening?” Amy demands, yanking her hands away from her cheeks and glaring at him.

“Uh, because I can handle one meeting with Jizzy Gillespie without you holding my fucking hand?”

“You know Liz didn’t call me until _after_ it was over.” Amy informs him furiously. “Because apparently as her chief-of-staff I’m not fucking needed at a crucial negotiation over a bill I spent months writing.”

“Ames, it was a meeting with the President of the United States, it was the least fucking consequential thing to happen all week. It was just an excuse so that Teddy can go on CNN tomorrow and tell America that their diaper rash of a president is still thinking about not vetoing a popular health care initiative, even though he is absolutely planning on doing that very fucking thing.”

“I’ve always been able to get through to him in a way you haven’t—“

“Because he wanted to _fuck_ you, Ames, but now Shawnee Tanz has her leash wrapped so tightly around his dick it’s a miracle he’s even fucking upright, so your presence wouldn’t have made a damn difference.”

“I still should’ve been there.” Amy mumbles mutinously.

Dan just rolls his eyes at her. To (sort of) change of the subject, he gestures to the table. “So, what’s all this, then?”

“Well, after Liz told me about that apocalyptic hellscape of a meeting, I went through the bill and marked all the sections that we could possibly get rid of in order to get _Dear Leader_ to sign it. It’s probably for nothing, but it was fucking something I could do this afternoon. 

Dan suddenly realizes that Cassidy has not emerged from under the table to greet him in any meaningful way, which is…unusual, to say the least, and he’s surprised by the petulant disappointment that pricks him a little. Two days ago she practically fucking tackled him the moment he walked through the door, and now he might as well be part of the damn table. On impulse, he ducks down to look at her.

“Cass,” he greets her. “ _Hello!_ ”

Somewhere above him, Amy snorts in disdain. Cassidy glances up from whatever book she’s looking at it and gives him an appraising glance, like maybe she’s not sure whether he’s worth disrupting her focus. It’s such a patented Amy expression that it almost makes up for her not saying hello to him in the first place. 

“Hi, Daddy.” she eventually says, and smiles at him sweetly.

“What did you guys do today? Mommy sent me a video of you in the rain.”

“We went to the park and got cupcakes. A lot of cupcakes.” she adds, giggling to herself

“Did you save one for me?”

“Nope!” Cassie shoots back gleefully.

“Wait, seriously?”

Dan straightens up and sends Amy an accusatory glance. He could have used a fucking cupcake after the day he’s had. “You couldn’t save me a damn cupcake, Ames?”

Amy just scoffs and finally comes around to his side of the table, stooping to pick up her phone on the way. “How the hell did I wind up with _two_ childr—oh _wait_ , I voluntarily married you, that’s fucking how.”

“We ate them all.” Cassie explains, her voice disembodied once again. “And I saved one for Richard.”

“Which means she ate four cupcakes before having the most spectacular sugar crash.” Amy adds under her breath. 

Looking over her, Dan thinks he can still sense the weight of this morning hanging over her, like clouds visible at the very edge of the horizon, a light switch dimmed. Up close, something about the exasperated twist to her mouth seems a little less sharp than usual, the spark in her eyes just a little less bright.

“That seems pretty typical.” But Dan’s not really thinking about cupcakes anymore. He reaches out and brushes a hand over the curve of her waist to pull her closer, bypassing her sweater altogether and skimming his palm directly over the warm skin underneath. Amy comes willingly, her face focused and intent in a very different manner now. She reaches out and flexes her hands on his shoulders, still tense from the day. It feels insanely fucking good, and Dan bites back a groan since Cassidy is right underfoot. But since she can’t actually see what her parents are doing, it’s _totally_ acceptable for him to run his hands lower over Amy’s body, shamelessly squeezing her ass, and Amy’s eyelids flutter for a moment. Impulsively, he leans forward and presses a kiss in the dip just above her collarbone, revealed by the open collar of her sweater, and Amy lets out this tiny sigh, barely even a whisper, that makes him want to carry her upstairs to their bedroom immediately.

When he looks back up at her, her eyes have that lovely, dark sheen to them and he knows they’re both reliving this morning’s sensational kitchen activities in fucking _exquisite_ detail. Amy reaches out and traces his lips with her fingertip, slowly, her eyes going even darker. _Shit_. Maybe he can convince Cassidy to hang out in her bedroom for a quick half-hour before dinner…forty-five minutes at the most.

Amy clears her throat and says, in an almost casual tone of voice, “Oh, I need to tell you: we all have to go out to my mother’s again on Friday.”

Dan immediately stops fantasizing about the morning.

“What?!”

“She wants to have a dinner with all the family who are close by, and that includes you and Cassidy."

“Fuck, _really_?” Then it occurs to him. “Wait…is this why you were fluffing me just now?!” 

Amy just looks at him underneath her eyelashes. “Did it help?”

“Depends on if you’re actually gonna make me go.” What with the downward trajectory of the health-care bill and the impending arrival of his parents, the prospect of spending his Friday evening socializing with a bunch of Brookheimers feels like pouring salt in the fucking wound of this endless week.

“You _have_ to go.” she tells him firmly, dropping her arms around his shoulders, and Dan groans in frustration.

“But I thought I was a _distraction._ ”

“You are, but now you’re one that I can use. Everyone will be too excited to meet Danny Egan from CBS News to talk to me.”

“So that’s all I’m good for.”

“You’ve never minded before.”

Dan’s too distracted to use it as a way to get her into his lap or to start feeling her up. The only thing he gropes for now is a way to get back at her. “Well… _my_ mother called me today, and both she and my father are coming into town for your dad’s funeral, so…we’re fucking even on the family front, Brookheimer."

Amy actually stumbles back from him in horror. She looks truly appalled.

“ _No_ …you’re not fucking serious.”

“Apparently, your mother posted the details about the service on Facebook and my mother saw them.” Suddenly restless, he gets up and heads for the kitchen, intent on a drink.

“Oh my god, Dan!” Amy follows at his heels. “Why didn’t you tell her not to come?!”

“I _did,_ I fucking told her to stay on whatever boozy swingers cruise lounge deck they’re currently trapped on, but she fucking insisted.”

“Oh my  _god._ ” Amy sounds legitimately panicked. “Please don’t tell me…you told her they can’t stay with us, right, I can barely handle my own family right now and they’re in fucking _Maryland—_ “

“No, they’re staying at a hotel, but we’re definitely going to have to suffer through least one dinner with them, maybe two.” He wheels around so suddenly that Amy, right behind him, nearly faceplants into his chest. “And oh yeah, by the _way_ , did the date for your dad’s service get finalized and you decided to not fucking say anything?”

“Oh.” Amy says, and she blushes a little. “Yeah, it was, and I…I must have forgotten to tell you.”

“Okay, well, were you planning on fucking telling me before the actual day?

It’s not that he really _cares_ about going to Amy’s dad’s funeral. He honestly did not give a shit about the man, other than as a frequent and convenient babysitter about whom Amy cared quite a lot. And it’s not like he has anything to _say_ about Mark Brookheimer, any fun stories to share over a beer. _Yeah, the man fucking hated me and went to his grave believing that I was going to screw over his daughter, ha ha ha ha…_ somehow he suspects that won’t fly at the wake.

But at the same time…he always assumed he was going. It wouldn’t _look_ good otherwise, and who’s to fucking say that can’t be his primary reason for attending? Cassidy was obviously going. And…Amy should just fucking remember to tell him things.

“Of course I was going to tell you!” Amy says defensively. “It’s next Saturday. The 4th of April.”

“So…two days before the vote.” Dan replies, in a very flat voice. “The worst possible date.”

“I didn’t have any fucking control over it, Dan, and the way it’s going…I just want to have it all fucking over with, okay?” For the first time since he got home, she looks as uncomfortable and lost as this morning, and Dan immediately decides they’re going to _not_ talk about this anymore tonight. Liz’s voice echoes his ear: _it changed his whole fucking life in ways he couldn’t even predict…_ fuck that, they’re not doing that. For the first time, it feels like the death of her dad and the fate of Liz’s health-care bill might be linked, and that’s so fucked up he forcibly expels the thought from his brain.

From the dining room, the sound of Cassie turning pages has gone quiet.

Dan’s stomach suddenly twangs in hunger. “Have you ordered anything for dinner?”

“Not yet.”

“ _Great._ ” It comes more testily than he means it.

Amy looks affronted. “You’re home _early,_ what the fuck do you—“

“No, it’s fine, I’ll make something.” Actually, the idea of banging a lot of shit around the kitchen seems very soothing right about now. “Do…do we have any real food in the house?”

“I don’t fucking know.”

“Jesus, I thought having a stay-at-home Amy would be more fun.” he pouts, heading for the stairs to change.

“Stay at home yourself!” she shouts after him, and Dan makes a face at her over his shoulder.

 

* * *

 

The weather is still shitty and there’s not a lot in the kitchen, so he ends up making this chicken chili thing, a recipe he's had in his back pocket since his early days as a congressional intern, always broke at the end of each month. Apparently she’s feeling conciliatory or something because Amy actually volunteers to run down to the Whole Foods five blocks away for whatever else he needs. While she’s gone, Cassidy finally emerges from the dining room and follows the spicy scents into the kitchen.

“I’m _hungryyyy._ ” she whines, climbing up on the stool. “Can I have a snack?”

“You had four cupcakes earlier, kid. So no.”

“Bleah.” she groans, sticking her tongue out at him. She’s still clutching the giant book from earlier, so big she can barely fit her little arms around it.

“What are you reading?” he asks, in an attempt to distract her from her desire for snacks 

“An encyclopedia.”

“An _encyclopedia_?!” What the hell, Amy’s actually turning this kid into a nerd before his very eyes, and he’s told her a million fucking times, Cassie’s way too cute to ever have to rely solely on her brains.

“Mommy bought them for me.” Cassie explains, hugging the book close as though it’s her most treasured possession, clearly pleased with her acquisition. “We went to the bookstore before the cupcakes.”

“She bought you all the letters?” For a kid who can’t really read yet, Dan doesn’t know whether or not to be impressed or disturbed 

“ _Yes._ I’m going to read all of them.”

“I’m back!” Amy announces, coming into the kitchen with a grocery bag balanced on her hip and a case of beer in her hand. She’s flushed from the cold, and there are raindrops glittering in her hair. “Smells good.” She dumps the bag on the island and Cassidy immediately peers inside to see if there’s anything edible. “I got you that bougie craft beer you like from that brewery in Arlington, Dan, even though it literally tastes like oily body wash. Cassie, no, you had four cupcakes.” she says, neatly tugging a bag of sunflower seeds from her daughter’s grip. Cassie makes a little growling noise in response, like an angry cat, and Amy gives her an exasperated look, at which point her daughter subsides into a sulk. “Oh, and the invitations for the White House Easter Egg Roll came.” she adds, pulling three cream-colored envelopes out of the pocket of her coat and slapping them down.

“I thought we were banned.” Dan says. In 2023, Cassie and Christi Caruso had gotten into a little… _altercation_ over the last Easter egg, which Cassie definitively won, and Candi Caruso banned them in a rage from the event. Amy hadn’t given a shit, but Dan had been openly dismayed. The Easter Egg Roll was always one of the prime family events of the D.C. social calendar, where Dan could show off the three of them as a single unitwithout it seeming forced. That year, the pictures ran for weeks.

“We were banned under Montez. Apparently under the Ryan-Tanz regime we’re green-listed again.”

“Oh, well then, _excellent,_ can’t fucking wait to see what kind of havoc Jonah wreaks with a bunch of preschoolers.” He catches Amy’s wary glance, and adds, firmly. “ _No_ , Ames, you’re fucking going. It’s not for another three weeks, and the exposure is too good, you know it." 

“Fine.” she grumbles. “You plan it, then.” 

“It’s already planned, babe.” Dan smirks at her, cycling through his mental rolodex of every single outfit both of them own. Maybe this is an excuse for a new suit. Distracted from cooking for a second, he scrutinizes Cassidy for a moment, thinking about what she should wear, pink or green….“By the way, Ames, a set of encyclopedias?”

“For _kids._ ” Amy clarifies, bringing the vegetables over to the counter. “And they come as a set, dumbass, not that you would have any idea. Why the hell would I buy her just one encyclopedia?”

Dan just shakes his head, grinning at her. When Amy reaches for a knife, he immediately nudges her aside with his hip. “Hey, _no_ , back the fuck away, I don’t have time to fix whatever you fuck up.” Amy’s cooking skills have not improved with time.

Amy makes a exasperated face at him. “It’s cutting a damn celery stalk, Dan, you’re not fucking Emeril.”

“Wow, biting the hand that _literally_ feeds you, Ames.”

“I thought you liked it when I did that.” Amy says, in an innocent voice so that Cassie won’t really pick up on the innuendo, and then darts out of reach when Dan swats lazily at her ass with the dishtowel.

All in all, it’s the most normal dinner they’ve had in quite some time, and by far the earliest. Cassie reads her encyclopedia and they talk about work over her head while she occasionally interrupts to tell them new “facts” that she’s pretending to learn from her book, when really she’s just reciting shit from her field trip to the museum last week.

After dinner, they sit in the living room and finalize the answers to Liz’s town hall event. Dan turns on the fire in the electric fireplace and Amy spreads out her notes and briefing books all over the coffee table and Cassie crouches next to her mother, working on her stupid “draw four things that start with D” homework. Dan stretches out on the couch behind both of them, lazily interjecting as Amy plays aloud with the language, and tugging on her hair whenever he wants to make a point. At one point he gets a call from a client and while he’s on the phone Cassie crawls back over his legs to show off her drawing of her stuffed dog, and yeah, he can definitely cross _artist_ off the list of potential future careers.

Dan can probably count on two hands the number of times in a year they’re ever just sitting around the house like this, basically settled in for the night, still working but not really urgently. Of course, everything’s been temporarily thrown off because of Amy’s dad, but for tonight, that just means Dan can let himself fully enjoy the evening without having a fucking identity crisis.

It’s _nice,_ okay, with the firelight casting golden glints over Amy’s wavy hair as she mutters to herself, Cassie climbing all around the furniture and asking if they can go with Liz to her event over the weekend so she can skip more school. Today fucking sucked (except for the mind-blowing kitchen sex part of the morning), and it just…sucks a lot less right now.

Later in the evening, when Amy’s upstairs trying to corral Cassidy into bed, there’s a knock on the front door.

Dan fully intends to ignore it. He’s warm and comfortable and on his second beer while he reads Amy’s notes. He’s not moving for anyone.

But after a minute passes, whoever it is knocks again, this time more insistently.

“Shit.” he mutters, and struggles up off the couch.

“Ames!” he yells over his shoulder. “Why the fuck are there so many typos in this, Jesus, have your interns forgotten how a fucking keyboard works, or did you rehire Mike and not tell me?”

Still absorbed in the notes, he opens the front door, preparing to tell whichever girl-scout/missionary/lost delivery boy to get the fuck off his front steps.

Instead, it’s Selina Meyer standing there in the rain.

 

* * *

 

“So,” Dan begins. “How is…”

But he doesn’t really know how to fill in the rest of the sentence. He hasn’t seen Selina since before the 2022 midterms, at a party fundraiser in New York. She had come for the first hour, given a short welcome speech before the dinner, and then slipped out the back. Amy had been running around in her usual manic way all night and Dan had been trying to recruit a deputy ADA in the Southern District to run for a recently vulnerable seat, so neither of them had had much time to spare for Selina.

“…Little Richard?” he finishes, awkwardly.

Selina ignores him. She’s looking around the living room like she’s suddenly found herself in the middle of a fucking crime scene. The flashing blue and red lights from her motorcade, clashing with the firelight, merely heighten the effect. Her eyes rake over him—quite possibly this is the most casual he’s ever looked in front of Selina, in his oldest jeans and a flannel button down, his hair less perfect at the end of the day—before moving to the ornate windows, the modern fireplace, the luxury sofa set (Selina is not dressed down at all, in her usual four inch heels and a forest-colored sleek sheath dress, her hair perfectly styled, which only reinforces his suspicion that she’s come here for a very particular purpose.) Dan can see her taking in all the evidence of a living, breathing child in the house: Cassie’s block castle from Monday night still erected near the tv, crayons on the coffee table right next to Amy’s copy of the health-care bill, the little yellow sweater she was wearing earlier discarded on the floor.

For a moment, he sees the room the way Selina must be, and it feels like getting hit over the head with two-by-four (probably wielded by Past-Dan). Jesus, that’s his _daughter’s_ sweater on the ground. That humiliating picture she drew of him is still lying on the coffee table where anyone can see it.

Selina moves closer to the mantelpiece, over which hangs a trio of photos from Dan and Amy’s hastily-improvised New Hampshire wedding. In the left one, they smirk at each other on the courthouse steps, in a shot taken before the ceremony began, Amy in a tea-length white dress, Dan in his shirt-sleeves. In the middle, Cassidy whirls, delighted, in a shower of flower petals that she had ripped from Amy’s impromptu bouquet, the hem of Amy’s dress just visible in the background. And on the right, Dan’s dark head bends to whisper something in Amy’s ear, his arm around her waist, a private, satisfied smile on her face.

Caught up in Selina’s barely-concealed skeptical bewilderment at the house she’s found herself in, Dan barely recognizes himself in the photos, even though he insisted they put them up for exactly this very reason, so that when people come over the three of them will look like a fucking _happy_ family, attractive and glossy and politically viable, not two opposites who spend seventy-five percent of the time fighting with each other and the other twenty-five percent trying to get to their kid to go to bed at a semi-decent hour.

“Huh,” Selina says, after a few moments. “These are different than the ones you released to the public.”

“Yes.” Dan agrees. The two pictures they had released to the public had been very staged; it had taken _forever_ for the photographer to get one where Amy looked semi-natural and not like she was being fucking held hostage at her own wedding. Amy hates being photographed, for all she's decent on television, and for some reason, remembering this simple fact about her relaxes him, causes the claustrophobic feeing in his throat to dissolve.

“So…where _is_ Amy?”

 “Putting Cassie to bed.” Dan tells her. “Which could take a while.” 

Selina looks a bit confused. “Isn’t…isn’t it early?”

Dan tilts his head a little quizzically at his old boss, takes a second to appreciate the hilarity of the fact that he’s about to tell Selina something about _parenting._ “…it’s almost eight thirty, Selina.” And Cassie already gets less sleep than most kids her age, because Dan and Amy aren’t bothered enough to get all rigid about things like bedtime. They wouldn’t even see her most days if they insisted on a regular bedtime.

Selina lets out a little awkward laugh, not even really bothering to hide her discomfort. She and Dan both know that Selina has no fucking idea what it really means to get a kid ready for bed or how much sleep is ideal for a five-year-old. Dan’s also prepared to bet every single one of his prized suits (well…no, he’s not) that Selina has no idea how old Cassie is.

“Do you want a drink?” Dan asks her, because Selina’s clearly not ready to say whatever she’s come to say. “Seriously, the bed thing could take a while.”

But right on cue, there’s a thundering cascade of footsteps and Cassidy careens into the room, shrieking at the top of her lungs.

“ _Daddy!!_ Daddy-Daddy-Daddy, Mommy says if I don’t go to sleep the _President_ will—“

The second she sees Selina (and the Secret Service agents lurking in the front hallway), she stops screaming so suddenly it’s like her vocal chords have fucking snapped. Selina turns around and practically jumps a foot in the air.

“Jesus _fucking_ Christ!” she gasps. “Oh, shit, sorry, I—“

“I guarantee you that she’s heard worse.” Dan replies dryly.

“For fuck’s sake, did you hatch her in a lab to your exact fucking specifications or—“

And then there’s Amy’s enraged voice on the stairs as she races down after her daughter. “ _Cassidy Brookheimer,_ I am going to count to _three—_ holy shit, ma’am!” She’s so shocked she actually stumbles right into Cassie, grabs her around the shoulders to steady herself. Her eyes go straight to Dan, an expression of complete disbelief on her face.

“Amy.” Selina greets her, sounding more like they’re back at her campaign headquarters instead of a Georgetown living room and Amy’s late for a meeting. The ex-president and her ex-staffer stare at one another, taking each other in, the seconds stretching into a full minute, and the sudden surfeit of awkward emotions in the air makes Dan shove his fingers through his hair just to have something to do with his hands.

“Wh-what are you doing here?” Amy asks, clearly struggling for control of the situation. “I thought you were in Morocco, for the African Union conference.”

Dan had no idea she was keeping tabs on Selina’s movements, beyond whatever made it on to Twitter. It surprises him, and also it doesn’t.

“Oh, yeah, I decided to fucking blow that off, you know, there’s only so many fucking diamond billionaires you can rub shoulders with before you realize you’re not doing jack-shit to stop toddlers getting ass-fucked by war-lords in the DRC."

Dan’s eyes meet Amy’s briefly. That statement seems…distinctly out of character (to put it mildly), since Selina’s _always_ viewed her international work as inherently pointless beyond whatever political clout she gained from it at home.

Cassidy’s giant eyes are flicking back and forth between all the adults in the room, clocking all the weird energy. Clearly feeling distinctly ill at ease with a young child in the room, Selina turns to look at her more fully and smiles her “campaign baby” smile, all teeth and saccharine sweetness. It does absolutely nothing to change the look of apprehension on Cassie’s face. She was literally born on Selina’s campaign trail, and even if she’s too little to really understand the politics of it all, she knows instinctively that that type of smile means absolutely nothing.

“Hi there, darling.” Selina says, her voice pitched higher. “Do you remember me?”

Selina had, obviously, never shown much interest in Cassidy’s existence in the year and a half they existed in each other’s orbit, beyond blaming her whenever Amy and Dan appeared distracted at work. She always steered clear of the “baby compound” during the election (whichever hotel room had been set aside for Little Richard and Cassidy to spend their time, safely supervised by multiple nannies). Once in Lexington, she had actually grabbed Cassie _instead_ of Little Richard on her way out to schmooze a rope-line, and she hadn’t even noticed until some coal-smeared lady-miner in a Kentucky basketball jersey had asked her, “Madam President, did your lesbian daughters adopt _another_ baby into their sinful lifestyle?” It had been the primary extent of their acquaintance.

Regardless, Cassidy was still a presence on the campaign trail, occasionally popping up in the campaign’s Instagram feed in her miniature _Meyer-for-President_ gear, whenever Dan could sneak the photos past Amy. She said her first words (“Mama election”) during a late-night strategy meeting. She took her first steps at the end of a rally in California. Dan’s got photos of that too, with Selina in the background, going off at Gary for something that had gone wrong during the event.

But of course, Cassie won’t have any memory of that. Amy and Dan haven’t seen Selina for years; there’s no way their daughter remembers her. Indeed, she just stares in confusion at Selina and then silently looks up at Amy for help. She’s gone uncharacteristically shy, Dan notices, probably because she’s picked up on the fact that neither of her parents have any fucking clue what’s going on.

“Cassidy,” Amy says, leaning over to look her reassuringly in the face. “This is Mommy’s…friend, Selina Meyer. Can you say hi?”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Cassidy whispers, well-trained, but still tentative. She turns so her cheek is pressed against Amy’s thigh.

“She’s…ah, _very_ pretty, Amy.” Selina comments, which is probably the highest form of praise she knows how to give a child.

“Thank you.” Amy replies, and looks pleased in spite of herself. “Ma’am, if you don’t mind me asking, how did…how did you find out?”

A quasi-hopeful, expectant expression illuminates her face as she speaks. It’s immediately obvious to Dan that she’s talking about her dad, and the idea of it is so fucking poignant that it’s practically pathetic. He feels a strange rush of protectiveness—so completely instinctive, he’s not even sure where it’s coming from. 

Selina looks confused. “How did I find out what?”

Dan sighs, because he just _knows._ “Ames, that’s not why she’s here.”

Amy’s face shutters so fucking fast and suddenly she’s wearing the expression he saw every damn day on the last five months of Selina’s reelection campaign, rigid anger crossed with disappointed disbelief, like she couldn’t believe that fucking _yet again_ , Selina was living down to her expectations.

Selina looks between them, annoyed that she’s out of the loop.

“I was in town for the—what the fuck are you two looking at each other like that for—“

Safe between Amy’s legs, Cassidy announces, “My grandpa died."

Selina twitches, like she’s forgotten Cassidy is there, and for a second she actually does look stricken with embarrassment, her cheeks flushing. She turns to Amy again. “Oh shit—oh fuck, Amy, I’m so sorry—I had no idea—

“Thank you,” Amy replies stiffly, all closed up and prickly again.

“No, really, I know…I know he was, uh, _very_ important to you…”

Dan’s suddenly not in the fucking mood to stand here in his own damn living room and watch Selina try to conjure up a real human emotion about the death of Amy’s father. “Why are you here, Selina?”

It’s stupidly obvious that Selina is here to ask something from Amy, although Dan’s not entirely sure what. If it’s about a potential comeback, he’s got some fucking _thoughts,_ and honestly he’s kind of pissed that Selina wants to float whatever crazy idea she has without him in the room (Amy would just tell him the second she leaves anyway…right?) But she’s not going to say a damn word with him standing right here, that much is clear.

“Okay, bedtime, Cass, come on.” he announces. He walks over to where Amy and Cassidy are standing and neatly grabs his daughter up in his arms, balancing her against his waist. Cassie links her arms around his neck instinctively, obviously reassured by the gesture. Selina looks fucking _startled._

Amy meets his gaze as he passes her, her face a mixture of apology and defiance and maybe even a bit seeking, like she’s not sure what to do with Selina on her own. Dan just looks back, his face rigidly blank on purpose—he’s sure as hell not going to fucking rescue her, not until he gets included in whatever Selina’s plotting. 

Once he and Cassidy are out of sight from the living room, he hears Selina demand, “Get over here and let me look at that goddamn boulder on your finger, don’t tell me Dan _Egan_ bought that for _you—_ ”

“Who was that?” Cassidy whispers at the top of the stairs. She appears to have been suitably overwhelmed by Selina’s presence.

“Your mom’s old boss.” Dan explains, easing his way toward her bedroom.

“She looked sad.”

“Yeah, she lost her last election.”

“ _Oh._ ” Cassidy’s eyes go even wider. Kid’s still learning to write her name, but she understands the gravity of losing an election. “Oh _no_ , is that why she came to see Mommy?”

“I don’t know, kid.” Dan muses wearily. “Maybe.” 

One good thing about Selina showing up unexpectedly is that it spooks Cassidy into going straight to bed without any of the usual fucking dramatics, and Dan immediately camps out at the top of the stairs to start eavesdropping on Amy and Selina’s conversation and to start theorizing about her improbable appearance at their house (their fucking _house_ , when Selina had never before shown any interest before in how any of her team lived…)

There’s no way Selina came here seriously thinking about another election…what else can she run for? You don’t come back from two presidential losses, not as a woman, and nothing she’s done since then even comes close to freeing Tibet. There must be something else she’s thinking about. Jonah’s cabinet is basically still nothing but a dusty, fucked-out skeleton of an executive branch with half the bones missing. Four years out of the public eye…nine out of power if you count Montez’s first term…she could easily be desperate enough for a Ryan administration job.

Frustratingly, he can only hear snatches of conversation, the overlapping rise and fall of two female voices he knows intimately well. At one point, Amy lets out a short, sharp exclamation of laughter.

“Daddy, what are you doing?”

Dan jumps a foot in the air, clipping his elbow on the banister. Cassidy’s standing right behind him, peering over his shoulder. Jesus, when did she develop these fucking ninja-level creeping skills? 

“What the fu—Cassie!” he growls, trying to keep his voice low.

“I’m _thirsty_.” she hisses back.

Dan glares at her and rubs his arm. “Nice try kid, you already have your water glass in there with you. Get. Back. In. Bed.”

“I want Mommy to come say goodnight to me!”

Jesus fucking Christ. “I’ll go get her, fine, just… _bed.”_

Cassidy flounces back to her bedroom in a huff, and Dan decides he’s done hiding up here like some fucking spineless (it is _not_ because he’s embarrassed that his own kid thought of a way for him to interrupt their conversation before he did). It feels like they’ve been talking for hours, but according to his phone it’s only been forty-five minutes, which is _more_ than enough for Amy and Selina to re-bond or whatever they needed to do. For fuck’s sake, right now he feels like they’re back in his earliest days in Selina’s veep office and he was trying to muscle in on every private conversation they had, and _sorry,_ he doesn’t do that shit anymore. 

Dan gets up, takes a second to collect himself and get his most shit-eating, obsequious smile into place before strolling leisurely downstairs. 

The energy in the living room is completely different once more. If possible, Amy’s withdrawn even more into herself, stiff at the edge of her seat, her shoulders so hunched over with tension that Dan could probably balance a plate on her shoulder blades. Selina leaning forward across the coffee table with a very familiar expression on her face, a calculated innocence that only she could ever pull off plausibly.

“Uh, can I get you ladies anything?” he asks, with less bravado than he originally intended. It’s pretty clear he’s interrupting a moment.

Selina looks like she’d forgotten Dan was even in the house. Amy doesn’t move, doesn’t comment on how pathetic he is eavesdropping at the top of the stairs, doesn’t even look at him. Her face has that same expression of disbelieving distress from before, dialed all the way up to eleven.

“Selina,” she begins, her voice doing that wavering thing it always does when she’s deeply affected by something, “is interested in the UN Ambassador position.” 

“Oh, so I guess nothing I tell you is confidential anymore.” Selina snarks exasperatedly. “You just tell Dan everything now?”

“I don’t work for you, ma’am.” Amy responds tightly.

Dan takes a seat on the couch next to Selina. Amy’s clearly two seconds away from internally combusting all over her armchair, but there’s something missing, it’s not clear to him yet why that news would be so upsetting. Selina turns her gaze to him, and there’s something cunningly hopeful in her expression. Like she’s already discarded Amy and is waiting for him to jump on board once he figures out the plan.

“Well…” he muses aloud, pretending for the sake of everyone’s sanity that this is still a casual conversation. “The job doesn’t get you jackshit that you’re not already getting with your whole Princess-Di-sainted-harbinger-of-world-peace thing you’ve got going on. Unless…you’re gonna try and leverage it into something else.”

And then he gets it. The reason why she’s here and not knocking down Sherman Tanz’s door.

“And then…when we challenge Jonah in four years, you want…State?”

“Or the VP slot.” Amy says, in a voice like her lungs have collapsed.

Selina smirks at him. “Took you a while, bozo, but you caught up there in the end.”

Dan can’t help but smirk back. “You know if you wanted a campaign consult, you could have just come to the office.” He says it lightly, to try and diffuse Amy’s evident horror. 

“That would have been too fucking official and you know it.” Selina tells him shortly. “I can’t fucking swan into that overpriced, orgiastic den of mirrors and glass you call an office without all of Twitter jacking off to the hint of a comeback. 

Dan nods. He can’t help but respect Selina’s clearly calculated, deeply cutthroat decision to approach them like this, in their house, under cover of night, to catch Amy off-guard. The fact that she’s here only five days after the death of Amy’s father is the kind of poisonous cherry on top that Selina always excelled at when it came to threatening Amy’s sense of self. 

“Well.” he says, turning to look at Amy. “This is an…interesting proposition, isn’t it, Ames?”

“I told her it’s a bit early for that kind of deal.” Amy tells him through obviously clenched teeth.

“The country is going to be so goddamn ready for someone else after four years of that deformed rabid yeti in the White House that fucking _Chucky_ is going to look like an appealing candidate. So I think it’s best to start planning ahead.” Selina replies coolly. “Besides, the two of you aren’t fucking subtle—it’s disgustingly obvious that you and your little firm are all in on Liz Halliday. The astronauts in that drafty money-hole of an International Space Station have probably figured it out by now, and they don’t even have fucking wifi up there.”

“Liz already has foreign policy bona-fides through her military career.” Amy points out.

“Not like mine.” Selina smiles a self-satisfied, bloodthirsty smile. “She can drops bombs on innocent Iraqi villagers. I freed Tibet. We’ve got both sides of the coin covered.”

She’s got a point. An unmistakable, politically compelling point. Dan can’t help but nod, his brain automatically flicking through potential campaign slogans and media narratives for a Liz/Selina ticket. It’s a viable play. A strong, popular VP pick would cement Liz’s primary challenge. Two women repairing Jonah Ryan’s destruction…the only thing America loves more than letting a white dude blow shit up for funsies is making sure a woman cleans up the mess.

Next to him, Amy looks stricken.

“You’d actually take the VP slot?”

“Or State, like I said. I haven’t made up my mind yet. But I do think being a part of the historic first all-female ticket would be enough of an incentive for me to lord it over the EEOB for another four years.”

Well. That’s just maybe the biggest fucking lie Dan’s ever heard Selina tell in her entire life and Dan can tell Amy doesn’t believe it either, because she lets out this choked snort of hysterical disbelief. Jesus, she needs to put her head between her knees and take a damn breath.

“Uh, Ames, Cassidy wanted you to come in and say goodnight.” Dan says, looking at her pointedly. It’s not a really subtle hint at all, but Amy’s too upset to care and Selina doesn’t give a shit either. He thinks for a second that Amy won’t take the out he’s given her—she just stares back at him for a second in mute stubbornness—but then she gets up and walks stiffly out of the room without another word.

Once Amy’s gone and taken her imminent breakdown with her, Dan feels like they can get down to fucking brass tacks. He and Selina could always talk one-on-one in a way the three of them couldn’t together.

“There’s no fucking way you’re actually considering the VP slot again.” he tells Selina flatly, draping an arm over the back of the couch. “State, yeah, but the veep’s office?”

Selina just crosses one leg over the other and luxuriously leans back against the cushions. The firelight illuminates tiny red sparks in her dark eyes, the effect comically diabolical. “Don’t be so fucking dumb, Dan.” She pauses and looks him over appraisingly. “But…think how much positive press I’d get out of the possibility. _Selfless_ Selina, returning from her international peace conferences to domestic politics only when the perfect _lady_ candidate has come along, conferring the legitimacy that baby Liz so desperately needs…”

Dan eyes her, impressed in spite of himself.

“So…you’d use the UN Ambassador gig and rumors of a partnership with Liz to just get back in the game. Liz is a newcomer, hasn’t been tested yet, you think you can overshadow her once you’re back.”

“Am I fucking wrong?”

“…you’re not.” Dan replies, slowly, and almost against his will, a scheming, slick grin tugs at his lips.

For a moment, he and Selina regard each other in perfect, familiar complicity, and Dan actually lets himself picture it: Selina back in the game, older but still attractive enough to mount a viable campaign (the way she looks tonight is proof enough of that, he’s not _looking_ exactly but he’s not fucking blind either.) She would be just experienced enough for a female politician that she could play the wisdom card. The odds would be stacked against her, but with a glossy international portfolio, the name recognition that Liz didn’t quite have yet, and the fact that Jonah was always a little bit scared of her… 

Orchestrating Selina’s comeback would be fucking _huge._ And Dan’s always had an eye out for huge.

“You know Amy will never go for it.” is what he says instead.

Selina just shrugs. “Nothing like a fucking _marriage_ as political leverage.” Her eyes fasten on his wedding ring with an expression not entirely unlike that Ohio communications director, Summer whatever-the-fuck, like it symbolizes nothing but an obstacle to overcome.

Dan just coughs. “That’s one way to look at it.”

“The great Dan Egan, fucking wedded and bedded.” Selina continues, warming to her theme. “A domesticated daddy with your precious little girl. _Girls_ , I should say. You didn’t want to try for some fucking gender parity in the household?" 

“Oh, one surprise kid was more than enough. They’re fucking expensive.”

“The cost of Catherine’s fucking psycho-therapy treatments alone…” Selina shudders dramatically, still traumatized by the financial burden of parenthood. “Hopefully your kid has more spunk.”

 _Well, she has a mother who doesn’t fucking hate her,_ Dan reflects wryly to himself.

“And you have this fucking _nice_ house. I remember Gary wouldn’t shut the hell up about it, he was so excited. I had to ask him for things _twice_ , he was so distracted with the goddamn curtain samples.”

“Well, he doesn’t have much else in his life.” Dan acknowledges and flashes Selina a little crooked grin.

It feels _good,_ very good, to sit here with her and scheme and insult Gary, like all those times the two of them lounged on the couch in Selina’s office or whatever hotel suite in whatever campaign stop, drafting a speech or working out some new policy or media-strategizing. Up to a certain point, it was the easiest part of the job, handling Selina on his own. It always felt a bit like driving along the edge of a cliff at one hundred miles an hour, exhilarating and crazy and fucking addicting.

“Uh, _yeah._ ” Selina laughs, as though she wouldn’t completely implode without Gary around to personally sift the coconut out of her artisanal granola and stuff her hips into some Spanx. “Seriously, though, it’s like the fucking Twilight Zone in here, Dan, I hope you’re aware. Amy always fucking lost her common sense where you concerned…but you…”

She runs her tongue over her lips, thinking.

“I would have bet a lot of fucking money that you’d have bailed by now. Or fucked up so badly that Amy would have taken the kid and put so many fucking lawyers between the two of you that you’d have to communicate in Morse code for the rest of your sorry little lives.”

Dan just shrugs. Selina’s far from the first to take that view of their relationship. He’s pretty sure Ben and Kent have a bet between them. It’s not like he doesn’t know why. “Hasn’t happened yet.”

“Well, since you decided to take on little Amy for life, fucking cheers to you. No one else would ever touch her with a twenty-foot pole, she was basically the full-body version of that fucking death-grip on her phone. And definitely not with you pissing on her every chance you got, like some fucking lapdog with a malfunctioning bladder.”

“I’m not her fucking _lapdog._ ” Dan retorts, nettled. It’s one thing for him to marry Amy, and quite another for Selina to come charging in here with low-blow accusations about how he’s being led around by the balls now, basically comparing him to Gary.

“She’s got you all in on Liz Halliday.” Selina comments shrewdly, and Dan feels nothing so much as trapped, sudden rebellious panic rising in his throat.

Liz is the best bet right now. Amy wouldn’t be working for her if she wasn’t; he, Ben, and Kent wouldn’t have kept her as a client if she weren’t. And he and Amy work for her in different capacities. But…but it doesn’t mean that they’re bound to work for the same fucking people for the rest of their lives. Nothing has fucking _changed_ , Dan wants to shout. The kid, the house, the marriage… _none_ of it changed a fucking thing for him. Professionally, politically—the only ways that have ever mattered to him—Dan Egan’s still looking out for number one.

“Amy is the one that works for Liz Halliday. She retains the firm, that’s all.”

He ignores how much it tastes like a lie in his mouth.

Selina just smiles even more widely at that, like he’s unknowingly given her some gift. “That’s what I like to hear.” she purrs, and leans forward. “You were always so good as my attack dog, Dan. Because you were always in it for yourself first. That’s why I hired you.”

“It’s why you fired me once, too.” Dan reminds her, but there’s no heat to it, just an acknowledgment of all the reasons they worked so well together, and all the reasons it was never fucking sustainable, not without someone else in the room.

Footsteps behind them. Amy’s walked back into the room, looking significantly less upset than when she left (Cassidy’s always had a perversely calming effect on her.) Instead, her face is almost starkly resigned.

“You two all caught up?” she asks, unsmiling, and there’s something about the way she says it that makes Dan wonder if she was listening to their conversation out of sight. Shit. He forgot for a second they weren’t in Selina’s old VP office, safe behind a closed door.

She doesn’t catch Selina off guard, however.

“Yes.” she replies smoothly, rising to her feet and neatly stepping past Dan. “I think I’ve given you both a lot to think about.”

She walks over to Amy. In her heels, she’s slightly taller of the two, and the blurry firelight merely emphasizes the contrast between them, makes Amy look smaller even in her red sweater and bright hair. “Think it over. Jonah’s not filling the position anytime soon, so I have time to make my overture. Amy, I do think Liz and I together could make a real fucking splash."

“You’re not wrong, ma’am.” Amy replies quietly, unconsciously echoing Selina from earlier. She actually steps back to let her old boss continue first into the front hallway, the motion familiar and natural. Dan waits a moment before getting up and following them out.

In the hallway, Selina’s arranging her hair over her coat while her agents scan the front walk. Amy seems to be consciously avoiding his eyes. Through the open door, Dan catches a glimpse of Gary, underneath an umbrella, pretending to inspect the azaleas that border the sidewalk.

“Gary was in the car this whole time?” Dan asks, and Amy laughs quietly. “Jesus, I hope you rolled down the fucking windows.”

“Well, now he’s supposed to be up _here_ with my damn umbrella.” Selina snaps crossly, stepping out onto the little porch in front of the house. “Gary!”

Automatically, Amy follows her out the door, forgetting perhaps—like Dan had earlier—just when and where she was for a moment, the impulse so second nature. _Wait,_ he thinks, senselessly, and before he really knows what he’s doing, he reaches out and wraps a hand around her elbow. 

Amy doesn’t look up at him, doesn’t even really register his touch (he’s still not sure if she’s tired or upset with him or what her deal is), but she does lean her head back very lightly against his chest. In her sock feet, she barely reaches his shoulder, and he has to fight the urge to wrap an arm around her and rest his chin on top of her head. Amy wouldn’t like that, in front of Selina.

Gary comes darting up the stairs, his umbrella aloft like the damn Olympic torch. Selina _tsks_ at him impatiently.

“Hello, Amy!” he greets her pleasantly and then scowls at Dan. “I love what you’re doing with your hair. Tell me, do you still have those white curtains I put in Cassidy’s bedroom? I think white is impractical now for a five-year old, so you should really think about switching them out for a nice dove shade, or maybe even silver—“

 “What the fuck is this, your gentleman’s gay network knitting circle?!” Selina interrupts. “We have to go!”

“Right,” Gary mutters hastily, and holds out the umbrella properly so Selina can step safely underneath it.

Before descending the steps, she turns back and looks critically at her two ex-staffers, framed in the doorway, Amy leaning back against Dan. Her mouth twists.

After a few seconds, she flips a hand at them, almost like she’s tossing a grenade. “I did not think this would ever fucking work.” she says, and shrugs disdainfully.

And she walks to the car without a backward glance.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m so, so sorry for the update delay. The back-half of S7 was quite distracting (for obvious reasons), and this was a difficult chapter. But I am very attached to this story, even as it continues to mutate into a monster, and finishing it remains my priority, since the finale was such a blah whimper on the Dan/Amy front.
> 
> An editing note: if I sat on every chapter until I was completely satisfied with it, this story would take ten years to finish (at this rate, it still might take that long…) So I do go back and tweak chapters that have been posted, mostly fixing missed typos or adding/removing sentences here and there, if those kinds of changes are of interest to anyone. At some point, I also plan on significantly re-writing the first four chapters (as if I am not a person with a sixty-hour work week who writes fanfiction in five-minute increments at her desk.)
> 
> I’m so astoundingly appreciative of every single reader. Your reviews are so supportive and thoughtful and specific, they literally inspire me to keep building out this little world. It’s hard to overstate how important they are. You guys are the reason this fic is becoming what it is.


	9. Chapter Eight

* * *

 I don't want you to hurt,

I don't want you to sink.

But you know what I think?

I think you'll be fine.

Just hang on and you'll see -

But don't make me wait till you do

To be happy with you.

\- jason robert brown, _the last five years_

* * *

 

Selina’s mini-motorcade hasn’t even reached the end of the block before Amy goes back into the front hallway, so abruptly her shoulder clips Dan’s upper arm as she stalks back inside. Dan stays on the front stoop, the wet chill seeping in through his clothes, and watches the red lights dissolve slowly through the mist, until only the street lamps illuminate the rainswept avenue.

In the kitchen, Amy’s angrily collecting dirty dinner dishes from the countertops and violently banging them into the sink and the dishwasher. Whatever calm had temporarily overtaken her during Selina’s exit appears to have evaporated. Now, she’s back to looking like her old boss showed up and threatened everything she’s ever held close.

Dan folds his arms, leans back, and watches her placidly for a few moments as she attacks the dishware (if nothing else, it’s always fun to watch Amy take out her rage on inanimate objects, and not even just for the turn-on). 

It’s only when the banging get so forceful that it might wake Cassie that he intervenes. Without warning, he reaches out and yanks a plate neatly from her grasp, just as she’s about to slam it down onto the counter. Amy gasps. Dan’s pretty sure she forgot he was in the kitchen with her. 

“Time to use your words, babe. Just like they teach Cassie in kindergarten. If she can figure it out, so can you.” 

Amy glares at him so fiercely that he’s pretty sure she’s considering throwing the pot of leftover chili at his head. 

“Don’t patronize me, dickhead.” 

“Okay, you need to calm the fuck down.” he says exasperatedly, putting the plate down and reaching out to grab her by the shoulders. “You’re acting like she showed up with a strategy handbook and employment contracts, not some half-baked idea for a comeback that she wants someone else to finish planning for her because she’s too fucking lazy otherwise.” 

“I do not _care._ I fucking do not care that she came with nothing, it’s still—“

“Ames, she’s not even _interested_ in being Liz’s VP or Secretary of State, she just wants a way back into Washington.” 

“Oh my god, no _fucking_ shit, Dan.” snarls Amy, completely scornful, and she jerks out of his grasp so violently she almost falls backwards. “Did I do something to make you think I’m dumb?! I don’t need everything spelled out for me in fucking refrigerator magnets the way you do.”

“Whatever. All I’m saying is don’t lose your head just because she’s thinking of making another comeback. Fucking spoiler alert: the last one didn’t work either.” 

“She will fuck everything up.” Amy insists. Her eyes are practically unfocused, dilated with rage. “That is what she does. Everything she fucking touches turns to Chernobyl-level radioactive shit sludge.” 

“You don’t have to let her _dictate_ everything.” Dan groans. “For fuck’s sake, it was just an idea, Ames, it’s not even likely that she’ll pull it off. She’ll only ever get as close Liz as you let her.”

“I don’t need _you_ , of all people, telling me to how manage Selina.” Unbelievably, Amy actually turns her back on him like they’re a pair of damn teenagers having a fight about their social studies project, which immediately makes Dan’s head feel like it’s about to fly off with rage. He's got no patience for whatever the fuck passive-aggressive bullshit she's trying to imply. 

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he snaps. 

“You obviously thought her idea was an _interesting_ one.” Amy says, mockingly superior.

For fuck’s sake. Somehow tonight he’s found himself stuck between two women who have each basically accused him of having no fucking backbone when it comes the other. Dan grips for the edge of the kitchen island, as if maybe he could break it in half. 

He doesn’t give a fuck what Selina thinks. Not really, not when it counts. Yeah, he thought about what it would might be like to work for her again for two whole fucking seconds, because she showed up and dangled a very shiny if not-exactly-fucking-likely job opportunity in his face. Not everyone is like Amy, who practically signs her name in blood when she goes to work for someone new (for Christ’s sake, she left Buddy _only_ when he voluntarily ended his own campaign without consulting her.)

But he _does_ give a fuck what Amy thinks, and they’ve been together long enough that he can at least admit _that_ to himself (out of all the things he still doesn’t want to admit to himself.) And the idea that she thinks, after all this time, _still,_ that he’d make such a major professional move without talking to her first…

Just like this morning (Jesus, this morning feels literally like one hundred years ago, _how_ is this day not fucking over yet), when they were fighting about Amy’s dad and Amy’s guilt, the argument’s suddenly about to morph into a different fight entirely, one that he doesn’t know necessarily how to end.

Suddenly, fighting about Selina seems way easier than fighting about…other stuff.

And besides, Amy doesn’t get to fucking lord it over him regarding any lingering attachments to Selina. Whatever political draw Selina’s always held for him, it doesn’t even touch how far back she and Amy go. They practically fucking created each other.

“Please,” Dan finally says, in his most familiar, everyday _Ames-you’re-so-goddamn-annoying_ voice, and for a split-second, she actually looks relieved. “ _I’m_ not the one keeping fucking tabs on her like some baby Gary-in-training”

Amy gasps, all dramatic indignation. “No--!"

“Don’t tell me that you of all people wouldn’t jump ship if she had the fucking momentum.”

“I wouldn’t.” she insists, fiercely defensive. “I would _not._ ”

“For fuck’s sake, do you really think my political instincts are that shitty, that I’m going to throw my considerable fucking reach behind an irrelevant political has-been this early in the game?!”

“Newsflash, Dan, I always thought your political instincts were shit.”

And she looks so pleased with her own comeback, so smug and haughty and _cute,_ that Dan startles himself by laughing at her, totally involuntarily. Amy just stares at him, like she can’t decide if she’s more pissed or amused.

“I’m _serious,_ Dan.” she insists emphatically, even as her expression starts to veer toward fond, rather than furious, and her total self-seriousness in the moment just makes him laugh harder.

“No no, I believe you, you’ve only said it every fucking day for the past eight years.” he replies, and then Amy starts laughing too, begrudgingly. The air in the kitchen loosens a bit, the dust finally settling after Selina galloped through their easy, relaxed night. Like they’re back to standing on the same ground. And Amy assuring him that he’s nothing but a short-sighted dipstick vampire with a pretty face…that’s just been, like, the main constant of his life ever since he met her. That’s just _her._

In the living room, someone’s phone starts beeping. Dan holds up a hand, still half-laughing, moves first so Amy won’t have to.It takes him a moment to find them, an indication perhaps of how badly Selina’s visitdisrupted their evening. His phone is the one that’s going off, and there’s a split-second where he’s fucking _positive_ it’s going to be Selina. Selina, reaching out with a message just for him: how gratifying it was to reconnect, how they should meet again the next time he’s in New York…

But of course it’s not Selina, just a series of late-night email notifications from one of BKD’s private investigators who’s gathering intel on the governor of Pennsylvania.

When Dan walks back into the kitchen, Amy’s no longer standing near the sink, and at first he thinks she’s fled the kitchen again, like on Monday when they were fighting about Cassidy’s teeth.

“Amy?”

He walks around the corner of the kitchen island and promptly almost trips over her. She’s sitting on the floor _,_ her chin on her knees, staring into space. As though standing up was suddenly too much work.

“Uh…” Shit. He knows how to handle Amy throwing things, Amy ranting, Amy pacing in a fury. Amy on the floor…Amy on the floor is a brand-new phenomenon.

After a beat, he sits down next to her gingerly and stretches out his legs. “Ames, you know I’m _all_ for fucking more in the kitchen, but can we do it up against the fridge? Floor sex is fucking killer on my back, you know that.”

Amy huffs out a laugh into her arms, relaxing very slightly so that her side is fully pressed against his. She doesn’t respond, though. The silence between them is full of whatever’s going through her mind right now, shadowy, opaque thoughts that he can’t dispel for her, the specter of Selina still floating over the room.

“…She had to come all the way out here, to our house?” she finally says, almost plaintively, lifting her face to meet his eyes. Her use of the plural pronoun causes this weird surge of relief in Dan’s stomach. “She wanted to fuck with my head, Dan.”

He just nods, because, yes, that is exactly what Selina wanted.

“When we were younger…” Amy begins. She’s so clearly wrapped up in her own head that Dan doesn’t interject as usual in order to protest that he’s still young and they’re going to live forever. “…I would have fucking _killed_ for her to show up on my doorstep looking for campaign advice. I knew she never would—she fucking called me at all hours of the night, so it’s not like she didn’t know where to find me—but it was just this stupid thing…like this pipe dream, that I was too important to ever let go.”

Dan doesn’t say anything right away. Suddenly, he’s reliving Selina’s last campaign too.

It had looked reasonably functional to outsiders, but on the inside…inside, all of them, even Ben, were striking daily deals with the devil to try and survive it. Ben and Kent were barely speaking by the end of it. Catherine and Marjorie had their couples therapist on the road with them at all times. It almost destroyed his and Amy’s relationship permanently. And Selina and Amy…by the end of it, Selina was threatening to fire Amy probably twice a day. Would have, maybe, if firing her single-mother-but-possibly-also-dating-Dan-Egan-campaign manager wouldn’t have looked terrible in the press. Would have, maybe, if Dan hadn’t threatened to quit.

Next to him, Amy’s face has an echo of an old, familiar anguish written on it. A different kind of pain than her feelings about her dad. Dan hates it just as much. Maybe more, because he can actually sort of understand it, better than he understands what’s going on with her dad, anyway.

“You want me to charge her?” he finally offers. “She got, like, a solid billable hour out of us. We can just say that we retain you as an off-site associate.”

Amy turns her head and smiles at him, a real smile, like he’s _finally_ said the right thing. “You dummy. We both know she’d just tear up the bill.”

“Yeah.” he grumbles. “She was always fucking cheap like that.”

They lapse into another silence, less pensive than the first. This time, Dan’s the one to break it.

“What are you going to tell Liz?” he asks, voicing what’s gone unsaid since the moment Selina’s motorcade took off into the night.

Amy sighs and curls into herself again (away from him). Bites her lip, looking deeply preoccupied.

“I have to pass the bill first.” she says, sounding exhausted and discouraged at the prospect. “Then I can make a decision.”

“Then _we_ can make a decision.” Dan tells her, a stubborn reminder that he’s a part of this too.

But Amy doesn’t acknowledge him at all, just gets up without another word and returns to the dishes. Done talking to him for now.

 

* * *

On Thursday, they all take a breath. 

Amy goes back to work. Cassidy goes back to school. Dan goes back to the gym during lunch (no heart attacks in _his_ future, thank you very fucking much). They prep for Liz’s CNN town hall and pretend that there’s still a chance they can override Jonah when he vetoes the health-care bill (there’s not.) Their babysitter, Jessica, picks up Cassidy after school, like normal, and Dan and Amy don’t make it home until nearly eight. While they’re eating the lasagna that Jessica made, Cassidy sings them a song she’s learning in kindergarten, except the song is in Spanish so neither of them have any clue what she’s singing about. Amy spends forty-five minutes on a conference call with her mother and her father’s sisters about funeral details while Dan reads Cassidy the finalized answers for the CNN event. When that doesn’t put her to sleep, he reads her more of condensed _Jane Eyre._ Against his will, he’s kind of getting into it.

Later, in their own bed, they watch an episode of the latest Game of Thrones spin-off on HBO while Amy proofreads parts of the bill (a process that is completely pointless but which she finds relaxing all the same) and Dan tries to convince her to let him skip the Brookheimer family get-together tomorrow night, arguing that at least one of them should fly with Liz to Iowa instead. They fight about that, and then they get into an in-depth discussion about which character on their show is going to die next. They don’t talk about Selina, and they don’t talk about Amy’s dad. Dan wakes up the next morning with Subtitle B, Part 26, Sect. 1509 stuck to his forehead and Amy’s head on his chest.

 _Normal, normal, normal_ , Dan thinks to himself, as all three of them pile into his car on Friday morning. Things better be going back to fucking normal. All they have to do is get through tonight. Tonight, they face the Brookheimers.

Around four thirty, Amy picks Dan up outside BKD and they battle traffic out of downtown to pick up Cassidy at school an hour earlier than normal. It’s the usual Friday afternoon pick-up chaos at Whitehaven, with the parking lot practically a hazardous driving zone, and unpredictable hordes of second-graders darting around, parents networking out the front windows of identical SUVs and Range Rovers.

As they walk up through the parking lot, Amy’s eyes flicker over to the playground and Dan hears a quick catch of breath that’s not entirely steady. Belatedly, he realizes that they were in this same place exactly a week ago. Exactly a week ago, Amy’s dad had just died, and exactly a week ago, Amy held Cassie’s hands on that bench to tell her that her grandfather was dead, in one of the more fucking surreal moments of Dan’s life. That Friday seems like one hundred years ago, and it also feels like all that shit happened just yesterday.

For the rest of her life (well, at least until Cassidy reaches the sixth grade and moves to the middle school building), Amy’s probably always going to think of that moment when they’re here. 

Dan doesn’t say anything, but he reaches out and tangles his fingers loosely with hers, squeezes hard once before releasing her hand so he can open the school doors for her. Amy throws him a quick, appreciative look underneath her eyelashes as she moves past him, and he knows that she understands. (And that’s all the moment they need to have about it, thank fucking Christ.)

Cassidy’s still out on the playground, having forgotten they were due to pick her up earlier, so Dan and Amy have to wait longer than usual for the after-school staff to round her up.

The front lobby of the Whitehaven Lower School is almost as crowded as the parking lot, clusters of waiting parents standing around with their children or else just waiting for them. Dan’s not really in a networking mood, so he drags Amy into the corner and hopes nobody bothers them while they stare at their phones.

He’s busy retweeting a series of political cartoons skewering Jonah when he realizes that Amy is wearing an entirely different outfit than the one she wore to work this morning.

“Hey,” he says, in surprise. “You weren’t wearing that earlier.”

Since her dad died, Amy’s been wearing a series of monochrome dresses and suits to work, a far more subdued palette than usual, with minimal makeup and hair so straight she resembles nothing so much as the twenty-nine year old Amy in Selina’s office. But now, she looks a lot more vivid than she has at any point in the past week, blossoming in the lobby amongst the endless dark suits and athleisure wear of the stay-at-home moms. Instead of the pale grey dress from this morning, she changed into a chambray shirt, artfully tucked into a pair of sleek black pants, and one of her favorite pairs of pumps, blush pink Manolo Blahniks that she only brings out for formal events. Even her makeup is more dramatic, her lips particularly kissable in a darker lip stain than usual.

In short, she’s dressed like they’re going out on to some hot new restaurant so Dan can put it up on Instagram, not sitting around in a suburban Maryland living room and reminiscing about her dead father.

“No, Sherlock, I was not.” Amy deadpans, eyes still on her phone. “Your detective skills are impressively crap-tastic, it took you…” she checks her watch, “…exactly thirty seven minutes to notice. What a lucky woman I am.” 

Dan ignores that. “Seriously, Ames, you look…really good.” he comments appreciatively, openly checking out the way the buttons of her shirt pull the material invitingly tight across her breasts. “When did you get those pants?”

“Dan, I’ve had these pants for over a year.” She glances up from her phone, notices his eyes all over her curves, and glares, which only makes him grin more lecherously. “Stop eye-fucking me, for fuck’s sake, this is a _school._ ”

“Well, where the fuck have you been hiding them?”

“What the hell are you talking about, I wore them when you dragged me to that stupid cocktail party Chip Gilmore threw that was _basically_ a fraternity reunion, seriously, no man should own that many lavender polo shirts and still get elected to Congress—

“You have _not,_ I would have remembered, we wouldn’t have even gone to the—well….” He pauses for a second, and then amends his thought. “We would have left early at least.” Then something clicks, and he moves closer to her. “Wait, wait, wait. Are you _nervous_ about tonight?”

“ _No._ ” Amy snaps, and goes back to her phone. Her cheeks are now pinker than her shoes. 

“You _are_ so fucking nervous!” Dan exclaims, delighted. “Seriously, Ames, we could have coordinated more if you were worried.” He’s obviously changed too, but only into his usual “evening at the Brookheimers” uniform (jeans and a knotty wool and cashmere cream-colored sweater from Ralph Lauren, pulled over his work button-down). “Is what I’m wearing okay?”

“You could show up in a fucking grocery bag and my family would find it adorable.”

“Well _yeah_ , obviously, but that doesn’t mean I can’t improve on my usual performance.”

“Whatever.” she mutters, shrugging irritably. “You look fine. You always look fine.”

Predictably, talking about the evening ahead has clearly keyed her up, and not in the fun way that always feels like foreplay. Dan wants _that_ version of Amy right now. 

“I really do like the outfit.” he says sincerely and slings an arm around her waist to pull her close against him. Even though they’re standing in a crowd of parents, he bends his head to speak directly into her ear, close enough that his lips brush her neck. “Wanna ditch your family and I can take clothes _off_ you instead?”

“Dan.” Amy hisses, but she doesn’t pull away. When she looks up at him, her eyes are sparkling. “We’re in _public._ ”

Dan opens his mouth (to kiss her or tease her, he’s not yet sure) but suddenly a shadow falls over them. Immediately, Amy stiffens (he can see her fingers clench around her phone) and Dan looks up in annoyance, preparing to tell whoever it is that they're fucking preoccupied. 

“Well, if it isn’t D.C’s happiest couple.” Bill Ericsson purrs down at them. A few yards behind him, a bored-looking fifth grader is standing there, staring at his phone. Jesus. Dan forgot he has two kids here.

“If it isn’t D.C’s most overpaid babysitter.” Amy snarks back. “Apparently slacking on his duties. Shouldn’t you go back to guarding the nuclear codes?”

“It’s Teddy’s evening.” Ericsson says. Playing along for now. Dan feels his temper rise at Ericsson's impassively self-satisfied face, the same damn expression he always has locked in, whether it’s a press conference, a fundraising gala, or merely shepherding Jonah on to Air Force One. And yeah, Dan knows that he has the rep for being the smuggest bastard in DC, but at least he got some fucking _charisma_ to go along with it. (And he’s always hated that Ericsson is taller than him. Barely an inch, but still. He fucking hates it.)

“Aw, does Shawnee work up the babysitting schedule?” he quips nastily, not letting go of Amy. “Do you literally sign in when she wants a night off?”

Bill ignores that. “I was sorry to miss your Wednesday meeting. It would have been a pleasure watching _the President_ throw you out of the Oval.” The way he emphasizes _President_ makes Dan want to haul off and punch him in the face.

“Please, that wasn’t even the first fucking time. Jonah throws me out of the Oval Office once every ten fucking days. It’s his way of showing his love.”

“Well, in spite of your star-crossed love affair, I can’t say the President is any more inclined to sign your cherished bill into law. I wouldn’t count my insurance premiums before they’re reduced.”

“Vetoing a measure that carries such a widespread support among the President’s own party, not to mention the American people, would be a really creative way to torpedo this infant presidency.” Amy says, in that purposefully matter-of-fact voice she uses when she’s trying to play off her own uncertainty. “Is creative the right word, Dan?”

“Oh, Ames, you’re being too diplomatic…I think ‘creatively deranged’ is the appropriate medical term.” Dan affirms. “But hey, the sooner our national pet colossus wants to asphyxiate his own presidency, the better.”

“It’s in America’s best interests for the president to consider a wide variety of health-care reforms, not the first one that randomly lands on his desk four months after the Inauguration.” Bill replies, still smoothly unruffled. “President Ryan remains unconvinced that—“

“Hi, Mommy! Daddy!”

Cassidy suddenly barges into the middle of their little circle, flushed and over-excited, her backpack practically bouncing on her shoulders. She’s wearing a cute denim dress with buttons down the front that is somehow miraculously still clean, although her headband is crooked and there’s a stripe of paint or glitter or something down one cheek.

“Are we going to Grandma’s now?!” she inquires excitedly, practically hopping up and down. Then she notices Ericsson looming over them all like the giant human boulder he is, and frowns.

“Who is he?” she demands crossly.

“No one.” Amy says hastily. “Cass, we’re going. You can tell us about your day in the car.”

“I work for the President.” Ericsson explains, by way of introduction, and also because he’s apparently as deaf to social cues as Jonah, just a lot better at hiding at it.

Cassie stares up at him for a moment. Then she opens her mouth and asks, “Why doesn’t the President want to help sick people?”

She asks him the question the way that only a five-year-old, could, innocent and profound and straight to the fucking point. She makes a good show of it too, basiclly pulling the same angelic face she uses on Dan whenever she’s really trying to get her way. In front of a stranger, it only makes her look more adorably ingenuous.

Ericsson, for the first time in the whole conversation, looks caught off guard. “Well, uh…little girl…“

But this is patently the wrong move. Immediately, Amy advances toward him threateningly.

“Oh my god, _no,_ you _do not_ fucking speak to her.” she hisses. “What the fuck is _wrong_ with you?!”

Before she can disembowl Ericsson and make a bloody mess in the very nice lobby, Dan grabs her arm. Some of the parents in their immediate vicinity have turned in their direction, intrigued by the raised voices.

“ _Amy,_ ” he mutters. “Don’t kill him here, for Christ’s sake. _”_

But she’s not listening.

“Listen to me, you derelict malfeasant who was somehow too fucking stupid to find a way out of the most predictable put-up job of all time.” she hisses dangerously. “Tell that fuck-fogged, soil-for-brains, jumbo _lurch_ of a president you serve that I swear on all the self-important, grandiloquent, pomp-ass presidential memorials in this fucking dystopian hell-scape of a town, I am going to pass this bill over his fucking dead body if I have to. Or I will string him up on impeachment charges so fucking fast, he won’t even know what’s happening until the Secret Service push him out the side of Marine One. Without a parachute.”

“Uh…” Ericsson stammers. The lobby has gone completely silent, everyone staring at the tableau unfolding before them. Amy is, of course, fucking resplendent like this, completely in her element, the air around her crackling with hot, staticky rage.She’s so impossibly sexy that Dan can’t take his eyes off her, stops caring about where they are and just stands back to enjoy the show. He’s _missed_ her like this, he suddenly realizes, she's been so...sad. 

“Tell him that from me, and see if it manages to penetrate the plagiocephaly helmet he wears after hours. You picked the wrong fucking week to mess around with _my_ legislative agenda.” 

And without another word, she turns away from him, Ericsson nothing but a cockroach she’s just crushed under the heel of her shoe.

“Come on, Dan, Cassidy. We’re going.”

She takes Cassidy’s hand and serenely heads for the doors. The crowd of parents part automatically for her, in silent awe. Dan follows, smirking so hard he can feel it in his cheeks.

“Some free consulting advice,” he tosses over his shoulder. “If you can’t answer a kindergarden question, maybe it’s time to rethink your fucking strategy. Consider that on your way back to the fucking Black Lagoon.”

And he strides out after Amy.

* * *

Too worked up to drive, Amy spends the first part of the Maryland commute ranting to Dan about the fucking audacity of Bill Ericsson to even _address_ Cassidy in their presence and when Liz becomes president she's going to fucking bury him so badly he’ll _wish_ he were still in prison. 

In the backseat, Cassidy doesn’t seem fazed at all by her first foray into legislative affairs. She seems more pissed that Ericsson called her little than anything else. 

And for his part, Dan is _wildly_ impressed at the brilliance of his own kid, who’s fucking with Jonah before she can even ride a two-wheeled bicycle. Not to mention the fact that she’s clearly processed at least some of the bill talk she’s heard _ad nauseum_ from him and Amy over the past few months. Even if she doesn’t really know what it means, it was still a fucking clever question. But he has to tone down that reaction because otherwise Amy’s going to get all on his case about how Cassie is an actual human child and _not_ a blank android that he can neatly program as his political legacy. And he’s enjoying Amy’s return to form so much, he doesn’t want to ruin it. He’s never met a woman on whom rage is so fucking arousing, and on top of her “night out” look, he just really, _really_ does not want to spend the evening trapped at her mother’s. There are literally a hundred better ways he can think of to spend the evening, most of which involving flat surfaces, his mouth, and Amy’s heels. 

Amy spends the second half of the drive explaining to Cassidy which Brookheimers she’s going to meet tonight. Dan, obviously, tunes that out.

Outside Amy’s mother’s house, Dan’s dismayed to find they have to park practically three blocks down, as the driveway and the surrounding street are filled with no less than—he and Cassie count—fourteen cars.

“Ames,” he grumbles, as they _finally_ approach the house. “The funeral isn’t even until next week, and I thought, like, half your dad’s family was in Florida or wherever.”

“Only some of them are in Florida. His brothers. The rest are in Maryland and Pennsylvania.”

Dan stops in his tracks at the edge of the driveway. “…Wait. So who are all these people?”

Amy doesn’t even look back at him. “My dad had five siblings, Dan. Two brothers in addition to his sisters.”

“ _Five_?!”

“I’ve got, like, twelve first cousins on my dad’s side. And they all have kids. That’s not counting my mom’s sisters. Weren’t you listening in the car?”

“Are they all here?!”

“No. Just my dad’s sisters, the ones Cassidy’s met. Some of their kids are here, I think, plus their own children.And two of my mom’s sisters who live in Pennsylvania. And a few of their kids.”

“ _Fuck.”_ Dan mutters, hastening to catch up with her and Cassie. _“_ What are you guys, the most fertile clan east of the goddamn Mississippi?!”

“Evidently, since even your weak-ass sperm managed to knock me up.”

“What’s sperm?” Cassie asks innocently between them. She’s still holding Amy’s hand. Dan practically chokes on the air.

“It’s what makes babies, Cass.” Amy replies, in a matter-of-fact tone of voice.

“I thought mommies and daddies made babies.” 

“Using sperm.” Amy sounds like she’s discussing the weather. Cassie nods like all of life's mysteries have been made clear to her. Jesus fucking Christ. Dan’s going to have a fucking panic attack and the night’s barely even begun.

“Can we fucking _not?!_ ” Dan sputters at Amy. “Save the sex talk for later and explain to me just how so many members of your family are even fitting into your parents’ house? It’s not _that_ big.”

“Well some of them can drive home, Dan, calm the fuck down.”

By now they’ve reached the large oak front door, and in spite of what she literally just told Dan, Amy lets go of Cassidy to smooth her hair and clothes one more time, taking a deep breath.

“Oh my god, you look _fine._ ” Dan says, fidgeting behind her. Now that they’re finally here, he’s ready to get the night the fuck over with. “Can we go in?”

“Mommy, you look nice.” Cassidy says sweetly, and points at her dress. “And we match. That way everyone will know you’re _my_ mommy.”

“Oh god.” Amy murmurs. “Thanks, baby. Are we ready?”

“Wait, Cassie, come stand by me, I’m scared.” Dan puts his hands on her shoulders and moves her to stand in front of him.

Cassie giggles. “Scared of what?”

“Uh…you’ll see.”

“Are you using her as a human shield between you and my family?” demands Amy, under her breath.

“I’ve been doing it since she was born, not my fault it took you five years to notice.”

She makes a face at him over Cassie’s head, and then (finally) opens the door.

Immediately, they’re hit with a wave of pure _noise_ , an avalanche of pulsing sound that’s somewhere between a high-pitched shriek and a tumultous roar. Dan blinks against the bright lights as they step across the threshold of the house, and there, stretching out before him, from wall to wall…a fucking _ocean_ of Brookheimers.

Tall. Old. Young. Short. Fat. Freckly middle-aged women in frumpy, flowery cardigans. Indistinguishable men in flannel shirts, broad-chested and beer-bellied. A cluster of women around Amy's age in off-brand athleisure and frozen faces. Frowning teenagers staring at their phones.

And they’re _all_ fucking blonde.

The noise is deafening, and Amy is practically knocked backward against Dan by the onslaught of people bearing down on them from all sides, grinning and calling to one another over the heads of the crowd.

“Hey, Amy’s here!”

“Oh my god, it’s Amy and _Danny Egan.”_

 _“_ Danny Egan! From CBS!”

“Oh my god it’s _so_ unfair, look at him, he’s _so_ sexy.”

“Hey, Little Miss Washington, can you get the government to erase my parking tickets?!” Followed by uproarious laughter.

“Holy fuck—“ Dan starts to mutter under his breath to Amy, but suddenly she’s swallowed up by a group of women her age, chattering in high, shrill tones, and far too quickly, she’s disappeared into the maw of people, leaving Dan and Cassidy to fend for themselves. Without the protection of her mother, Cassie immediately grabs onto the leg of his jeans, looking completely daunted in the face of so many foreign, intrusive Brookheimer eyes, all staring at her like she’s an endangered animal trapped in a zoo exhibit.

Three nearly identical blonde women around Mrs. Brookheimer’s age suddenly push their way through the crowd, staring at him with the kind of crazed, obsessive enthusiasm he hasn’t seen since his CBS days. Shit, these must be the aunts Amy had mentioned. As fast as possible, he hitches his best “Danny Egan, dashing morning news host” smile into place. It’s clearly the only way he is going to get out of this evening with all of his body parts still intact.

“Oh my god—“ the nearest one exclaims, holding out a hand. “Just, oh my god, I’m sorry—I’m Amy’s aunt, Susan, and I just can’t believe— _Danny_ Egan in this house—“

“It’s very nice to meet you.”

“And I just _can’t_ get over how much Cassidy looks like you, you’re just like two peas in a pod…”

And she reaches out to fucking _squeeze_ his daughter’s cheeks. Cassidy squeaks and clings tighter to his leg, turning her face away, which merely provokes an adoring cackle of laughter from the aunts.Dan tightens his grip on her shoulders. Jesus, crazy fans are only fun when there’s a security guard and a rope-line safely separating him from the madness.

“Seriously, you have to tell me!” the second aunt demands. “Were all those rumors true about you and Jane?”

“Valerie, you can’t ask that!”

“Uh, absolutely not—“ Jesus fucking Christ, those eight months co-hosting _CBS This Morning_ are going to haunt him for the rest of his goddamn life. “Jane and I were only ever very good friends.”

“Oh my goodness, he’s _so_ modest. I bet she was still _all_ over you.”

“We’re _so_ embarrassing, you must get this all the time.” The third aunt has her hands practically clasped beneath her chin, googly-eyed with glee. “I remember I just couldn’t believe it when we heard…that our little Amy had actually _snagged_ Danny Egan from our favorite morning show…”

“Is that what they say?” Amy never said anything about her extended family’s reaction to Cassidy, or their relationship, and Dan’s been under the impression they hadn’t given a shit. Clearly, he had falsely assumed the Brookheimers resembled _his_ family.

“Elizabeth, see, when you see the two of them together, she really doesn’t look like Amy at all.” the second aunt comments, critically, tilting her head to the side.

Before Dan can respond, the crowd parts like the goddamned Red Sea, and, thank fuck, Mrs. Brookheimer _finally_ appears. She looks like her usual polished self, considering her beloved husband died exactly a week ago. More stylish than her sisters-in-law, that’s for sure (no Talbots sweater sets for Mrs. Brookheimer). Still, her smooth façade can only mean one thing: some pure-grade, hard-core, Egan-levels of emotional repression going on. Dan respects that.

“Grandma!” Cassidy calls out, from where she’s practically sandwiched herself between Dan’s legs for safety.

“I see that our famous Dan has arrived.” Mrs. Brookheimer greets him warmly, reaching out her hands. “And this is my perfect granddaughter, Cassidy.”

Without another word, she takes Cassidy’s hand and firmly leads her away like some kind of prize pony. Cassidy gives him a wild look over her shoulder before they disappear into the mass of Brookheimers, and Dan’s officially left behind on the doorstep, surrounded by a bunch of women practically foaming at the mouth.

“Come!” the third aunt, Emily or Elizabeth or Ellen, he can’t fucking remember, grabs his arm. “We have to introduce you to _everyone._ ”

Amy owes him so fucking much for this.

* * *

He doesn’t bother to remember anyone’s name. Everyone just blends together in a great blonde blur. Every once in a while, a crowd of children emerge from the basement (evidently where they’ve coralled the youngest generation of Brookheimers) and streak through the first floor of the house like a tornado, to complain and seek attention and cause general havoc. There’s a pair of twin boys who seem particularly destructive, tipping a platter of mashed potatoes down the back of someone’s shirt within thirty seconds of their first tour of the dining room. Dan’s never been more grateful in his whole fucking life that Cassidy resembles him so strongly. At least he can identify her immediately in this platinum sea of Brookheimer second cousins. 

For the party—because that’s what tonight really is, an excuse to reunite every Brookheimer in the entire Mid-Atlantic to eat a lot before the actual funeral next week—Mrs. Brookheimer seems to have opened up the fancy dining room and sitting room in order to fit everyone. That side of the house is so packed with people, Dan starts to wonder if she’s closed off the rest of the house to force everyone to socialize. People seem to be fighting with each other almost as much as they’re chatting.

The only good thing about getting cycled through all the different groups of various Brookheimers is that he’s such an object of fascination, no one actually asks him anything about Amy’s dad. Well, the women don’t ask anything, at least. All they want to hear about is CBS and CNN and what it’s like being on television so much and does he happen to know any if that guy who was on that panel four weeks ago is single? (Meanwhile, the male contingent of the Brookheimer clan have very little to say to him, grouped together in the front of the tv and talking about football.)

Which is fine—it’s easier to talk about that shit than the reason why they’re all here. Every single female in the house who’s not Sophie or Amy is so completely star-fucked, he probably _could_ start talking about politics and they’d eat it up with a spoon. They’re not even listening to any of the actual words coming out of his mouth, far too distracted with finding excuses to touch his arms or force-feed him bites of pie.

Still, when he overhears Amy excuse herself to take a call from Liz, he extricates himself from a group of Maryland cousins and darts up the main staircase after her. He gets temporarily waylaid by Aunt Elizabeth, though, so by the time he makes it up to Amy’s room she’s hanging up the call.

“Everything okay?” 

“Yeah,” she sighs, turning her iPhone over in her hands. “They’re about to take off for Iowa. She says she feels good about tomorrow, but she wants to call in the morning before her event at the corn processing plant.” 

“She’s ready.” Dan says reassuringly. “It’s basically just campaign practice at this point.”

“Well, I won’t be there in person to see it for myself.” Amy mutters. 

Already, she looks like she wants the evening to be over. She has the same wound-up look she almost always gets whenever they visit this house, except a hundred times more painful _,_ which shouldn’t even be possible. For the first time, it occurs to Dan that being here without her father must be pretty fucking awful. All Amy’s memories of her father must center around growing up here, and now it’s full of people she doesn’t even like forcing her to talk about him.  No wonder she was so damn nervous earlier. 

“Uh, have you seen Cassie recently?” he asks, changing the subject. “I’m assuming she’s still in the house and no one has, like, kidnapped her out in a fit of parental jealousy. Some of these kids are eating with their fucking _hands,_ Amy.” 

“She’s fine, she’s with my mom. I swear to God, this evening is going to fuck her up so permanently. When she’s in therapy as an adult, she’ll fucking point to tonight as when it all started.”

“Oh come on, we’ve already fucked her up pretty efficiently, I think she can handle some bored grandmothers.” he says, and Amy actually laughs. “So can we go? I think we’ve put in enough face time with your family to last us for the next fifteen years.”

“We can’t go yet, Dan. We just got here.”

“We just _got_ here?!”

“It’s only been fifty minutes.”

“Only fifty fucking minutes?!” Dan practically yelps. “Fuck, I thought my watch had stopped.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Amy demands. “You should be loving this, a bunch of middle-aged women who can’t get enough of you?! This is basically your version of a fucking wet dream.”

“I can’t get anything out of _them,_ Amy. It’s not like fucking Aunt Susan can help us score the prime speaking slot at the Iowa Corn Grower’s Association fundraiser.”

“Well,” she huffs icily. “Just pretend they’re all rich widows who can donate to Liz’s campaign. Maybe that will make this evening slightly more bearable for _you.”_

She has to walk past him in order to leave the room, but Dan grabs her hand before she can escape down the hallway.

“Hey,” he begins, in a lower voice, “Ames, come on, I—“

“No, really, I’m sorry this evening is already _so_ hard—“

“Whatever, I don’t give a shit, it’s fine, but you look like you’re about to slit your wrists if we have to stay here a second longer—“

“Spare me the fucking psychoanalysis, if we stay here too long, someone will notice—“

“Who the fuck cares?”

“ _I_ do, everything I do tonight is under a fucking microscope, you have _no_ idea, Sophie’s probably already telling people we’re fucking up here—“ 

“Fine,” he says, stung, and lets go of her hand. “Then at least tell me who’s the wealthiest person in the house.”

“Figure it out yourself,” she snaps and practically flees for the first floor. By the time he makes it down the stairs after her, she’s out of sight, but Sophie’s sitting on the very bottom step, eating a bowl of cornbread and chili.

“Sophie?”

“Yeah?”

“Who’s the richest person here tonight?”

Sophie swallows and thinks it over.

“Great-Aunt Wendy. She doesn’t have any kids and she and her husband own some lame touristy flower shop on the bay. Why, you wanna fuck her too? She’s pretty old.”

“Anything'd be better than fucking you again.” Dan retorts, and goes to work.

He doesn’t see Amy again until about an hour later, after he’s successfully identified Aunt Wendy and spent a good forty five minutes convincing her that donating to political causes is a much more satisfying and worthwhile investment than donating to local animal shelters. They end up back in the big sitting room, where he spies Amy talking to Aunt Valerie with Cassidy at her side. Amy looks bored, and Cassidy’s got this mischievous, almost calculating glint in her eyes that triggers a warning in Dan’s brain…he knows that look, because it’s his. She’s about fifteen minutes away from calling someone a fuckface or spilling her juice on purpose. They need to release her soon or she’ll snap.

He snags a piece of maple brown butter cornbread from the spread on the dining table and walks over to their little group. “Ladies,” he says smoothly, handing Amy the food. “How’re you doing, kiddo?”

“Daddy!” Cassie exclaims in relief, as though she’s been looking for him all evening. “Here, hold my juice.”

She hands him her sticky juice cup without another word. Dan tries not to make a face. Amy laughs. “I’m just the butler around the house,” he quips, for Aunt Valerie’s sake. She laughs way harder than she should at such a lame joke.

“Actually, Dan’s the messy one.” Amy comments idly. Dan attempts to elbow her discreetly over Cassie’s head. Amy steps on his foot in retaliation.

“Dear, I just can’t get over how beautiful your daughter is.” Aunt Valerie says, ignoring their tussle.

Amy appears torn between agreeing and attempting to preserve one last shred of her daughter’s humility. Dan, who has no such qualms, just smiles and nods. At their feet, Cassidy looks bored. 

“Of course, you would hardly know she’s _yours,_ wouldn’t you, Amy, she takes after so Dan so much.”

Amy’s smile suddenly looks a lot more plastered on. “So I’ve heard.”

“You didn’t want a second child?” asks her aunt. “You know what they say about only children…”

Dan wants to tell her to mind her own goddamned business. Amy’s eyes meet his briefly before she glances down at her hands, clearly uncomfortable. “Uh…it just never seemed like the right time for another.”

Luckily, Aunt Valerie doesn’t pursue the topic, tilting her focus instead down to Cassie, who’s been observing the blond twins in the corner stuff grapes into an antique vase with an expression of near longing on her face.

“Sweetie, tell me how old you are again?”

“Five.” she sighs gustily, clearly bored with this question.

“And what grade are you in?”

“Kindergarten.”

“And what’s your favorite part about school?”

“Reading.” She looks and sounds more robotic by the second. Dan is certain that she’s had to undergo this third-degree interrogation multiple times this evening.

“What else do you love about school?”

“I have a loose tooth.” she explains, brightening.

“She’s been telling everyone that all night.” Amy says fondly, looking down at Cassie with the warmest expression Dan’s seen on her all night. Probably because she’s not the one who’s going to have figure out a way to extract a loose tooth out of the mouth of a wriggly and dramatic five-year-old. It makes him shudder just thinking about it. Jesus, he thought the gross part of parenting stopped once they could go to the bathroom on their own and use silverware.

“How precious!” exclaims Aunt Valerie, as though Cassie is the very first person in the whole wide world to have a loose tooth. “Is the tooth fairy going to bring you a treat, dear?”

“…Yes.” Cassie says, sneaking a look at Dan. He raises an eyebrow at her and shrugs mysteriously, and she giggles at him. After this whole emotional minefield with Amy’s dad dying and having to endure these fucking tiresome Brookheimers (not to mention his parents, due to descend at any moment), she actually probably deserves a present of some kind. It might even allow Amy to relax her obsessive rules about not allowing Cassidy to get caught up in stupid myths for children. The kid lost her grandfather, he can buy her something nice. 

“You know, I haven’t lost a tooth in a long time.” Aunt Valerie says conspiratorially, as though she’s sharing a great secret.

Cassie looks Aunt Valerie up and down for a moment, with a very haughty, _no shit_ expression on her face.

“That’s because you are _old._ ” she replies flatly.

And there it is—she’s reached her limit. Amy chokes on her piece of cornbread, crumbs splattering over Aunt Valerie’s fuzzy peach-colored cardigan, and Dan coughs into the juice cup he’s holding. Both of them try to hide their smiles but don’t do a very good job; Aunt Valerie flushes in dismayed anger. “Amy!”

“Cassie, why don’t you go play with everyone else in the basement?” Amy says hastily, clearing her throat. Looking relieved, Cassidy scoots off without a backward glance.

“She spends a lot of time around…ill-behaved adults.” Amy explains apologetically, trying to turn the whole thing into a joke, but Aunt Valerie just gives her a cross look before stomping off. Dan and Amy watch her go, Amy chagrined, Dan amused.

“So…can we go _now_?”

“Oh, go play with the other five-year-olds, it’s where you fucking belong.” Amy grits out and stalks after her aunt.

“Gladly.” Dan mutters after her, and stomps off in the opposite direction.

* * *

The evening drags on. He nods through an absolutely mind-numbing description of what it’s like to professionally breed greyhound dogs from the Pennsylvania cousins, pounds a shitty beer during an in-depth analysis of the upcoming NFL draft, blinks mutely while one of Amy’s drunk uncles explains why he voted for Jonah. 

By eight thirty, he’s ready to grab Cassie, bail and leave Amy behind, since she remains mysteriously insistent on enduring the teeth-grinding misery of this evening. He doesn’t even really get why, it’s not like her mother is fucking alone, she has Sophie and a crowd of overbearing women here to attend to her every need. 

And he absolutely will _never_ fucking understand why Amy insists on maintaining any kind of connection with these people at all. Yeah, they’re her family, but so fucking what? That doesn’t mean shit, it’s just a word that means they all share a few strands of DNA. It would have been _so_ easy to get out of tonight, it’s not the funeral, for Christ’s sake, it’s not the damn _wake_ , it’s just the same kind of family gathering she’s ignored hundreds of times before. Amy exists in an entirely different fucking _dimension_ than these people. She’s the most intelligent and the most successful and the most attractive person in the family by fifty fucking miles. Her life is fucking fantastic ( _he_ should know, he’s at the damn center of it, him and Cassie.) And yet she’s forcing herself to endure an evening of people treating her like an alien just because she didn’t marry her dumbass jock of a high school boyfriend, settle down two houses away from her parents, and pop out a blonde brat every three years like fucking clockwork. 

She doesn’t belong here. She belongs with him, back in Washington, at their house, where she can stay up all night plotting to destroy Jonah and get Liz to the White House and no one’s going to tell her that stress is bad for your ovaries and that only children tend to grow up spoiled. (Please, Cassie’s not even, like, the fifth most fucking spoiled child in this house tonight.) 

Eventually, Dan manages to escape into the kitchen without anyone noticing. It’s mercifully empty, confirming his suspicions that for whatever reason, Mrs. Brookheimer confined the reunion to the other side of the house and kept the kitchen as the “staging area” for the night. The counters are littered with empty serving plates and extra bottles of soda. Most important of all, it’s _quiet,_ except for the dim chatter on the other side of the house, and the occasional thumping noises issuing from the basement, indicating the feet of many elementary school children running to and fro. 

Without a second thought, Dan fishes a beer out of the fridge and leans against the counter to catch up with his phone. It’s so soothing in here, he might just hide out for the rest of the night.

He’s not sure how much time has passed when there’s a rustle of movement nearby. The back of his neck prickles, and when he glances up, one of Amy’s cousins is standing in the entry way to the kitchen.

This one looks like a twisted carnival fun-house mirror version of Amy, the low-rent version of the stay-at-home mothers as Cassie’s school. Thick blonde hair (duh), the same light eyes, but there are deep frown lines etched around her mouth that the Botox can’t hide, and her fake-tan application is weak. Even six years on from CBS, Dan can still identify bronzer brands a mile away.

“Hello.” she says. She eyes him in a distinctly predatory manner that is embarrassingly unsubtle.

Very pointedly, Dan goes back to his email from the Governor of Pennsylvania’s chief of staff. “Hi.” He tries to make it sound as rude as possible.

“We met earlier.” the woman says, coming all the way into the kitchen. “I’m Amy’s cousin, Lucy.”

“Sorry, all you Brookheimers blend together.”

“So I’ve heard.”

Dan’s fingers still over his phone, his mind is suddenly racing.

Almost nine years on, the Sophie thing is nothing between him and Amy anymore. Almost nothing. Amy’s even joked about it privately a few times (privately.) God knows Sophie doesn’t give a shit anymore, and basically it’s been relegated to one of the more humiliating moments of his life that he never thinks about it if he can help it.

But…he’d carelessly referenced it earlier, distracted by his argument with Amy and forgetting for a moment where he was, forgetting that the house was filled with crazed Danny Egan superfans who were all jealous of Amy.

Still, Dan hasn’t worked in politics for more than twenty years just to fucking lose his cool over one ambiguously double-edged comment. So he just shrugs and says, “I’m kind of in the middle of something.”

“Yes, Amy was telling us,” Lucy says, too stupid to take the hint or actively ignoring it. Dan doesn’t want to look at her too closely, but he thinks she might be a little drunk. “Your super important _law._ ”

The idea of Amy earnestly trying to explain her health-care bill to all of her bored cousins actually makes his goddamn heart feel warm. _Amy_. He just wants to take her home.

“It’s called a bill, not a law.”

“You know,” she continues, edging ever closer. Dan can start to smell her musky perfume. “When we were teenagers, Amy used to talk this whole big game about not wanting kids, not ever wanting to be tied down, and it turns out…she was just after the biggest fish she could catch.”

And she reaches out to pluck a piece of fluff from his sweater, her fingers lingering on his chest. 

Dan blinks down at her. This is not fucking happening.

_Okay,_ he thinks, very calm. The evening is officially fucking over. He's done too. 

Abruptly, he pushes himself away from the counter, and shoves her hand aside without another word.

“Listen, Cousin Luce,” he begins, dangerously, and bares his teeth in his most shark-like grin, the one he saves for eviscerating lesser beings on television. “If you think you’re the first woman to play this fantastically suburban store-brand version of cat-and-mouse, I fucking assure you, you’re not even in the first one hundred, and literally all of them had better enhancements, the fucking _shoes_ that Amy’s wearing probably cost more. So, in the interest of your dignity…if you’re looking for the spare bathroom to shove your fingers down your throat and choke up that chocolate pie you were stuffing your face with earlier, it’s down the hall.”

Lucy doesn’t like that. Her face immediately crabs up, like he’s shoved a pile of horseshit under her nose. She folds her arms and hisses at him, _“_ I know that you fucked Sophie.”

“And _what,_ you’re going to tell on me to Amy?!” Dan sputters, almost laughing in disbelief. He can’t fucking believe he’s standing here in Amy’s mother’s kitchen having a fight with Amy’s cousin about Sophie because he interrupted her goddamned weak-ass _seduction_ of him. It's fucking absurd. All he wants to do is go home and fall asleep on the couch while his kid watches _The Lion King_ for the two-hundreth time. Jesus. When did this become his life?

“She knows?” Cousin Lucy actually looks disappointed, like her impossibly grand plan has been thwarted. Amy’s relatives are fucking _stupid._ “Sophie told me you weren’t even _together_ when she got pregnant. She said it was just a drunken hook-up and you didn’t even _want_ to be with her, but you didn’t have a choice.”

 _Fuck you Sophie,_ Dan thinks viciously. “Well, la-de-fucking-dah for you, it’s none of your fucking business, but I had a fucking choice, and Amy had one too. Now go away.”

She just pouts at him. “On TV, you seemed a lot more fun.”

“It’s called _acting—“_

“Lucy.”

Amy’s standing in the entrance to the kitchen. _Thank fuck,_ Dan thinks to himself, and it's immediately followed up with  _Oh fuck._ There’s a very unfamiliar sensation gushing up in his stomach: the urge to explain himself, to reassure her that nothing happened. He stomps it down.

“Lucy.” Amy says again, almost conversationally. “Your kids are looking for you.”

Lucy just rolls her eyes. “Danny and I were having a _very_ interesting conversation about—“

“No, you were not.” Amy interrupts her. Her voice isn’t trembling with rage. Instead, she sounds almost calm. As though Lucy is a baby intern who didn’t catch an obvious typo in a campaign mailer that’s just been sent across the entire Midwest, and Amy is explaining the problem _before_ screaming at her. “Your frontal lobe is physiologically incapable of producing a single word that’s of passing interest to anyone. You haven’t had a single original thought since the ninth grade, when you joined the cheer squad and started flipping your underage vag directly onto the face of the junior quarterback. And Dan is right, my shoes _did_ cost more than your shitty plastic boob job. So get out.”

Lucy’s learned enough in the last three minutes to know that there’s no point looking at Dan to rescue her. She scuttles past Amy into the hallway, leaving in her wake a wary silence between her cousin and her cousin’s husband.

Normally, Dan would have already forgotten the encounter with Lucy in order to revel in how fucking hot Amy is when she’s destroying her enemies (twice in one night, Bill Ericsson and now her silly cousin, Jesus, _when_ can they go home, he’s ready to fuck her in the nearest spare closet.) But somehow, the pleasure feels dulled over, blunted. 

This house is fucking with his head.

Amy wasn’t wrong. He’s had his ego sucked pretty consistently all night by a bunch of women who think he is God’s gift to humanity. Normally he’d happily put up with that shit (it’s not like they’re _wrong)._ But knowing that Amy’s having the exact opposite experience tonight, that nobody in her family likes her, or even really respects her (obviously they don’t respect her enough to lay off her fucking _husband_ )…it’s just ruined.

Amy finally opens her mouth, and immediately Dan can’t stand the idea that she gets to have her say first.

“I didn’t—“

“I know.” Amy says, and she actually looks surprised. She scrutinizes him for a second longer, her brow furrowing in what looks like disbelief. “Dan, I don’t think—I heard what you said, I—“

“ _Amy._ ”

He’s done. Done with talking about what just happened, done with her family, done with being here, done with having to pretend that either of them are cut out for this kind of family bullshit.

“What?!”

“What the fuck are we doing here?” he asks, and it sounds a lot more helpless and frustrated than he intended.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…you _hate_ it here. You fucking hate these people.” Suddenly energized, he moves forward to grab her hands. He’s been fighting the impulse to flee all night, and he can’t keep it back any longer, it’s surging up through his fucking ribs and his lungs and out his mouth. “Let’s go home, let’s get out, please, Amy—“

“Dan!” Her eyes are perfectly round with surprise.

“I’m serious, let’s go, let’s grab Cassidy and just get the fuck out, this place is making you crazy—“

“And do what?“

“Who cares?” _Go home, fuck all night, go into the office, keep Cassie awake long enough to take her to that late-night Korean place you like so much…anything that’s not here._ “Anything you want, as long as it’s fucking away from here.”

Now Amy is practically laughing at him, in disbelief and delight.

“I—“ She glances once at the door, longingly, and then turns back to meet his insistent gaze. She’s grinning fully, accepting his dare, and Dan gets a surge of smug, possessive glee right in his stomach. _Mine._ “Fuck it, fine, let’s go, we can go—“

She leans up into him, her face tilted up to his at that age-old angle he knows so well, wraps her arms around his neck. Dan grins wider, runs his hands down over her waist. When her lips are just millimeters from his, he murmurs against her mouth, “It was _super_ fucking hot watching you take down your low-rent cousin like that.”

Amy smirks at him underneath her eyelashes. “You’re so fucking predictable.” she breathes, and tugs firmly on his sweater to close the gap between their faces. Dan can feel her smile against his lips, and for the first time, he thinks the night can end up somewhere good after all.

And right at that exact moment, Amy’s mother breezes into the kitchen, carrying some empty pie tins, and trailed by Sophie and—thank fuck for this at least—Cassidy. At least all three of them are now in the same room. That will make it easier to get out quickly.

“Oh my goodness, we’re out of dessert already, I think Elizabeth hid an extra pie somewhere in the frdge…” She stops when she sees Dan and Amy, entwined in the corner, but she just smiles at them all indulgently, like the sight of her daughter making out with her husband has made her night. “Dan, hello! I’ve hardly seen you all night.”

“Uh, yeah, hi, Mrs. B.” he says begrudgingly, relaxing his grip on Amy. She’s blushing and smoothing her hair, but she doesn’t pull away from him, just turns in his arms to face her mother. “How are you?”

“Mommy, I’m _tired._ ” Cassidy whines, trotting over to where he and Amy are standing, and basically face-planting into her crotch. _Excellent,_ Dan thinks. Cassie’s done too, that’s a perfect excuse to leave early.

“I know.” Amy says, touching her nose. “How are you feeling, Mom?” she asks her own mother in the exact same tone. “It’s not too overwhelming, is it? There’s a lot of people in the house.”

“Oh, honey, I’m fine.” Mrs. Brookheimer says reassuringly, taking yet another pie out of the fridge and setting it down on the kitchen island. Dan would normally be wondering about dessert leftovers, but after tonight, he’s sampled enough Brookheimer secret pie recipes to last him until Thanksgiving. “It’s nice to have the house filled with people. I’d rather that than…”

She trails off, her bright, cheery expression fading away. Dan immediately starts looking for a way to sneak out—he’s not equipped to handle any genuine displays of emotions that aren’t Amy’s or his own kid’s—but unfortunately, there’s really only one entrance into the kitchen, so he settles for grabbing his abandoned beer bottle and staring fixedly at the label.

“Do you want us to stay here tonight, Mom?” Amy asks. Before Dan can hastily torpedo _that_ suggestion, Mrs. Brookheimer just shakes her head and pats Amy’s hand, her expression lightening. “Oh, it’s fine, honey. Your Aunt Susan is staying here until the funeral, and I think your cousin Sarah and her family are going to bunk here before driving back to Pennsylvania tomorrow. The house will be full enough.”

“And I’m here.” Sophie intones, her eyes on her phone.

“Do you _ever_ go home?” Amy says exasperatedly.

“What’s it to you?” snipes Sophie. “Not all of us have some fucking mansion in DC.”

“It’s not a mansion.” Amy retorts at the same time Dan says, “Don’t knock our house.”

“By the way, nice hickey you got there, Amy.” Sophie comments, in a very nasty tone. “Classy work, douche spray.”

Amy gasps and claps a hand over her neck, turning to glare at him accusatorily. “Shit, has it been visible this whole time?!”

“Is that what the two of you were doing in here?”

“No—“ Amy snaps at the same time Dan mumbles under his breath, “We were _trying._ ”

“Girls,” says Mrs. Brookheimer, tiredly. Typically, she seems to not have noticed Dan’s part in the little miniature fight unfolding before her. “Please not tonight. We have guests.” She takes a breath, and then says, “Sophie, of course you’re welcome to stay as long as you like. I’m certainly not looking forward to living here alone, as you can imagine.”

“You don’t have to stay here forever.” Amy sounds legitimately concerned. She moves closer to her mother, reaching out a hand. “You can sell the house, find a smaller place. We’ll help you.” 

Mrs. Brookheimer sighs. After a moment’s pause, she says, slowly “I just can’t imagine selling this house to a stranger…I don’t suppose you and Dan would want it?

Dan chokes around his beer. “What?!”

“What?” Amy echoes.

“ _What?!_ ” Sophie sputters, enraged.

“Would the two of you ever be interested? I wouldn’t want it go to just anyone…”

“It’s, uh, a bit far from work…” Amy ventures, even as she shoots Dan a furiously quelling glance, warning him to not say anything that might upset her mother. 

“A _bit_?!” It’s the only polite thing he can come up with to say. “Also, and I mean this in the _nicest_ possible way, Mrs. B…but, uh, we already _have_ a house—?“

“Oh Dan, of course I know you already have that beautiful house that you bought for the girls…” Out of the corner of his eye, Amy rolls her eyes. It’s both their names on the deed, but Mrs. Brookheimer still clung to the fantasy that Dan had bought the townhouse for Amy and Cassidy in some sort of grand romantic gesture. “But in case you ever wanted more space. And the schools are excellent, you know, for Cassie.”

Dan would sooner castrate himself than voluntarily move to Maryland, tack on an extra hour to to his commute every morning, and send his kid to a public school. 

(Although…having a second house might not be a bad financial decision. Maybe he should talk to his portfolio manager first…real estate was usually a decent investment…the market’s pretty hot, so they could just sell it again right away if they wanted. Then again, Amy would probably be opposed to the idea of flipping her childhood home for profit.)

“How come Amy gets the house and I don’t?!” Sophie whines furiously, yanking Dan out of his real estate reveries.

“Are we moving?!” Cassidy pipes up from the floor. All four adults in the kitchen jump—they’ve forgotten she’s there. 

“Go play.” orders Sophie. 

“Watch it.” Dan says, lightly. Just the barest hint of a threat behind it, not even looking at her. Cassie sticks out her tongue and then deliberately turns her back on her aunt to lean against Dan for extra protection. She ignores Sophie on principle.

“It’s just an idea, Sophie.” Mrs. Brookheimer says, although she sounds a bit like she’s regrets bringing it up at all. “Amy, you’re right, of course, it is far, but it’s just an idea. Something for you and Dan to think about. I’ll still be here for a while yet.”

“I can’t fucking believe you’d just _give_ the house to Dan and Amy!” 

“I wouldn’t just give it to them, they’d buy it, of course.” 

“So just because they can buy it, they get to have it?! Mom, what about me and my kids?!”

“You already have a place right here in town, honey.” 

“What were you going to do, mooch off Mom for the rest of your life?” Amy snaps. “Get your own fucking life, you are forty-five years old.”

“Ronnie and I are thinking about moving in together…and I want a real _house,_ I actually live here, you and Dan are never in Maryland anyway, you hate coming here.” 

All three women have forgotten that Dan and Cassie are still present, so locked into their tense triangle that everyone else is blocked out. If it weren’t for the fact that they’re _still_ impeding his way out of the kitchen, Dan would grab Cassie and run. She’s pressed closer to him anyway, out of exhaustion or because of all the volatile emotions in the room, he can’t tell. He brushes a hand across her head, idly, and when she peeks up at him, he grins reassuringly down at her. If she weren’t, you know, five years old, he’d offer her a sip from his beer. 

“You can’t have this house because you would never, ever have the money to buy it on your own, that would mean actually fucking _working_ —“

“You couldn’t either _,_ you just live off of Dan’s TV money and you think that makes you the queen of the goddamn universe—” 

“I do _not_ live off Dan’s TV money—!”

“ _Girls._ ” Mrs. Brookheimer orders, in a firmer tone than Dan’s ever heard from her before. In a flash, he has a sense of what it must have been like, refereeing Amy and Sophie as kids, and for the millionth time, he thanks his lucky fucking stars that Cassidy is an only child. “Please forget it for tonight. Nothing is going to be decided right now. Your father wouldn’t want the two of you to be fighting like this.”

At the mention of their father, Amy and Sophie finally subside in shame-faced anger, looking everywhere but at each other. 

“We need to focus on being a family, and preparing for the service next week. Can you do that for me?”

Amy nods stiffly. Sophie does this funny little jerk of her head that looks more like a twitch than a nod.

“Good.” says Mrs. Brookheimer pleasantly, her cheerful hostess expression securely back in place. “Now, let’s go back to our guests.” 

Dan seizes his chance before it’s too late.

“Actually, Mrs. B, we were thinking that we might head out—“

“Wait, just one more thing—“ Amy interrupts. Dan sends her an outraged look (what the _hell,_ he was about to spring them the fuck out of here.) “We don’t have to really talk about it now, but since we’re sort of on the subject…”

“Oh my god, you’re like a sad little puppy with a bone.” Sophie scoffs, not bothering to lower her voice.

Amy ignores her. “You don't have to worry about selling the house until you want to, but once the…the funeral is over, we will have to start thinking about the other legal and administrative issues. You know, all Dad’s pension stuff, the other bills for the house, probably the cars too…I’ll sit down with you, and—” 

“Oh, honey, there’s no need to worry about any of that.” Mrs. Brookheimer says dismissively. She picks up the pie again, clearly ready to head back into the living room. “Your father and I already took care of it all.” 

It takes Dan a second to realize what’s happened, but when he looks up from the label of his beer, Amy’s gone white and the temperature of the kitchen seems to have dropped twenty degrees. Next to him, Cassidy digs her fingers into his jeans. 

Oh, shit. 

“What?” Amy repeats, slowly.

“We sat down and went through all the papers together. Everything important is in my name. Of course, there’s still the will, but our lawyer will handle that when things are settled there’s no rush…”

That conversation with Sophie’s kids flashes across Dan’s brain again, and just as quickly, he shoves the memory aside. _No, that was nothing, that’s not the same…_

“…when did you do this?”

“A few months ago. Honey, why do you look so upset?”

“A few months ago!” Amy repeats, in a kind of horrified whisper-scream. Then, immediately: “Cassidy—out, now.” 

She sounds like she did on Election Night in 2020, when they got the first whispers that Oregon might go for Montez and not Selina as planned. As though all her control is rapidly dissipating. 

“But—“ Cassidy says mutinously. 

“ _Out._ ” 

“Daddy…“ she whines instead, and looks at him imploringly.

Dan shakes his head at her. The kitchen feels like a dangerous place all of a sudden, and whatever Amy’s on the brink of, he doesn’t want Cassie to see it. Not so much for her sake, but for Amy’s. He can’t help but remember Wednesday morning, when Amy was crying about her dad, how she didn’t want her daughter to see her like that. 

“Go on, kid.” he mutters.

Cassidy pouts, but obeys, and Dan resists the urge to run after her, wishes with all his fucking soul that he’d never come into the kitchen in the first place. But it’s like he’s pinned against the counter, incapable of leaving of his own goddamn will. The kitchen feels hot and cold all at once, too many emotions colliding and condensing in the air around him, suffocating them all. 

 _Shit_. Shit shit shit. They were so fucking close to getting out of here.  

“…You…you _never_ wanted to think about that stuff, before, it was always Dad’s job, you used to say…you said—“ Amy sounds like she’s having trouble forming the words, as though she needs to force her lips to move.

“I know, but your father thought it was time, in case something happened. He just had a feeling, dear, it’s very natural…” Mrs. Brookheimer looks deeply concerned by Amy’s reaction, which…for fuck’s sake, Dan could have told her this was going to blow up in her face.

“A feeling?!” Amy lets out this little deranged, high-pitched shriek of laughter. On the other side of the room, Sophie goes wide eyed with smug spite. “You’re saying he _knew_ this was going to happen now?!”

“No, of course not, he didn’t know for sure—“

“Mom—“ Amy interrupts desperately, almost pleading. “Mom, why didn’t you tell me?”

She sounds like a little girl who just wants her mother to make everything better, who _trusts_ that her mother will make everything better. She sounds like Cassidy. The agony of her tone...if he could—if he thought it was something that Amy wanted—he’d go to her now, pull her against his chest, make sure she could feel him behind her, with her,  _for_ her. 

“He didn’t want to upset you, dear…it wasn’t anything big, it wasn’t like anything had changed from the last heart attack…and…and you were so _happy._ ”

It takes another second for the magnitude of her admission to sink in, but when it does, Amy goes from white to bright, boiling red.

“Are you kidding me…are you _fucking_ kidding me?!” Her voice is shaking. All of her is suddenly shaking. She’s stripped so raw, it hurts to look at her.

Over Amy’s shoulder, Mrs. Brookheimer meets his eyes briefly, almost as if she’s seeking assistance, but Dan looks away. 

“Amy—“

“ _Mom!_ How could you—how could you—oh my _god—“_ Amy whirls away from her mother, her eyes wild, looking for something to throw. Or punch, maybe. She probably can’t see any of them anymore. “I cannot _believe—_ what sort of twisted—”

“Maybe if you were around more you would have noticed.” Sophie sneers, maliciously triumphant.

It’s the last straw for Amy. Without another word, she turns on her heel and walks out of the kitchen.

Her mother passes a hand over her eyes. For a moment, she looks every inch her age, the stylish clothes and hair merely exacerbating the lines of weary exhaustion on her face, dimmed-over eyes and stooped shoulders,

“Oh dear,” she whispers. “I didn’t…I didn’t mean for her to find out like that.”

Sophie rolls her eyes. “Jeez, Mom, don’t feel _guilty._ You know what Amy’s like. It wouldn’t have made a damn difference, she doesn’t give a—“

“Sophie.” Dan interrupts, speaking for the first time in what feels like a long while. His voice is rough. “Shut the _fuck_ up about Amy.”

Sophie closes her mouth abruptly, looking chastened for the first time all evening. Dan half-expects Mrs. Brookheimer to jump or faint or look horrified, but she just sighs. “Dan, can you…can you go talk to her, please? I don’t think she wants to see me right now.”

“Yeah.” he mutters, and follows Amy out of the kitchen.

But she’s already disappeared. Miraculously (or not), none of her family members seem to have detained her. She’s not in her bedroom. She’s not in her parents’ room. She’s not in the basement, where all of the baby Brookheimers, including Cassidy, are sleepily glued to some movie.

Eventually he makes his way out onto the back porch. There’s no moon tonight, and except for the porch light, the yard is completely dark, except for the blurry shapes of flowers and hedges emerging through the black. It’s a nice, suburban yard, perfectly landscaped and manicured: neatly trimmed shrubbery, a large raised-bed vegetable garden, and a miniature playground set that Mr. Brookheimer had installed when Cassidy was two. The swings on the creak back and forth in the chilly breeze. Dan shoves his hands into his pockets and represses the urge to shiver.

At first he thinks Amy’s not here either, but finally, after a few minutes of squinting through the dark, he catches the dull shimmer of her hair. She’s standing at the very back corner of the yard, almost hidden from view by the playground, with her arms clasped tightly around her waist.

He’s barely within ten feet of her when she speaks.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” she announces, and her voice is a warning.

“Fine.” Dan retorts. His only option right now is to be a big enough asshole that she turns around. “It’s not like I really want to talk about it either. I just need to know that this isn’t going to throw you back into that silly guilt mind-fuck you were stuck in a few days ago, because we did that already.”

It works. She practically whips around to face him. Apparently they are going to talk about it after all. “How dare you—how _fucking_ dare you—“

“So your dad put his goddamn affairs in order,” Dan interrupts, firmly. “It wasn’t like he was in such fantastic shape, and you knew that. What did you want, Amy, a fucking date to put your in phone?! Your mom couldn’t have given you that even if she wanted to. Tell me what would have changed.”

“I still should have been here. I should have…I should have taken more time off…I would have been _ready…_ ”

“You were already more _here_ than you’ve ever been before. For fuck’s sake, last year was the first presidential campaign in ten goddamn years that you weren’t running yourself.”

But Amy’s not listening to him, she’s turning away, caught up in that place he can’t follow. Won’t follow, when it comes down to it.

“I can’t even remember the last time he saw Cassidy.” she murmurs. “She’s going to forget. She won’t remember.”

 _“_ She’s still got your mom.” he says, but it sounds useless even to his own ears. What else can he say? Cassidy _is_ going to forget. She’s five years old and down one grandparent. There’s no way around that.

Amy buries her face in her hands and groans, the sound a rough scrape in the dark. “I can’t…I just… _How_ could I let myself think everything was going to be fine?! Nothing is _fine_ , ever, it’s always exactly one toxic, poison gas-filled, super powered grenade of shitty emotions away from exploding in your face and fucking up your life, and when I actually let myself fucking _be happy…_ ”

A chilly fingertip of foreboding at the top of Dan’s spine. This is new. So far, all of these angry, agonizing conversations about Amy’s mixed-up feelings have all mostly been about Amy’s dad and Amy feeling like shit for not being a better daughter. This is about something else.

“What, it’s a fucking crime to like your life now?! You didn’t do anything wrong. He wanted you to be happy.”

“I don’t know what he wanted.” she says into the night, and she sounds as bleak as he’s ever heard her. “Maybe if I had been around more, I would have known.”

Dan scrambles for a way to keep the conversation about her dad.

“At least he got to see you, you know…” he gestures awkwardly in the air, “…have a kid, buy a house, get married…” A year and a half later, he still almost trips over saying it.

“Yeah, he _loved_ waking up to the news that his daughter had gotten married in a spur-of-the-moment courthouse ceremony in the middle of bumfuck New Hampshire, mostly so she could fuck up someone else's presidential campaign announcement. Every father’s dream.”

“So? _You_ liked it.”

“That’s not enough!” she spits at him viciously.

Dan stares at her. Suddenly the cold is filling his lungs, congealing in his stomach, freezing his blood. She’s not talking about her dad anymore. Liz’s warning, roaring in his ears again. _Everything changed. Her whole life will change._

 _No,_ Dan thinks rebelliously, beams it up to the fucking sky, to whoever is fucking listening. _Nothing is going to change._ He has everything he wants. _Amy_ has everything she wants. Since when has that not been fucking _enough_?

For a second, the desire rises up in him to push back, to demand _what the hell exactly, Amy_ is not enough. But having that fight here is a bad fucking idea, he knows that deep in his gut. Neither of them are thinking straight.

“Look, Amy,” he begins again, consciously pitching his voice lower, to try and hide his anger. “Nothing is going to be enough for the people in there, okay, they don’t…they don't even know what we _do,_ okay? They’re not mentally equipped to process it. Cassie understands more than they do. So you’re better off not trying.”

“Easy for you to say.” she says, but she unclenches herself just a tiny bit at his words, and Dan deems it safe to take a few steps closer. They’re _so_ close to getting out of here, so close he can feel it in his teeth.

“I get…I get why it sucks that they didn’t tell you, okay? I do get it. Your _mom_ should have told you.” It finally feels safe to try for a bit of levity. “Your family is so damn chatty I’m honestly surprised no one told you by accident. Even Sophie’s kids went fucking on about it like it was no bi—“

“Oh my god.” Amy whispers, and takes a step backward.

“What?”

“ _You_ knew?”

Dan’s heart actually skips a beat. Fuck. _Fuck._

“No!” he insists, the protest coming out on pure instinct. “I did _not_ know Amy, I swear, it was just…they were talking about something Sophie had told them, about your dad, I was _barely_ listening…”

Amy just stares and _stares_ back at him, and his voice dies away underneath rigid reproach of her gaze. Facing him, she’s like a lantern in the dark, her eyes and her hair and her skin all glowing with rage and heartbreak. She’s beautiful like this, in a way he’s never seen before, the grief bringing out a furious kind of fragility. Magnetic, but untouchable. Dan does not dare try and touch her like this.

“What was I supposed to do?” He finally demands of her, and he hates how defensive he sounds. “Run straight to you because they _maybe_ had an advance warning? It was the same fucking afternoon, for Christ’s sake, you were a goddamn wreck.”

“I don’t give a flying fuck about semantics right now.” Amy says in a deadly tone of voice. She doesn’t look stunned and outraged, like she did before in the kitchen with her mother. She looks like she’s mad at herself for not figuring out it earlier, and somehow, that feels _way_ fucking worse than if she started screaming at him.

“Ames,” he groans in frustration, “I…I didn’t think it was a big deal…” It’s a lie. He had known, from the beginning, that Amy would freak out, no matter what, and he had just…ignored it, pushed it to the back of his mind and hoped it would go away. He had enough to deal with, a broken Amy and Cassie still grasping to understand what had happened.

“Not a _big deal._ ” she repeats, mockingly, and now she looks angry. “Go back inside, you fucking useless imbecile. I cannot look at you right now.”

“None of this is _my_ fault, Amy.” He flings back at her desperately, scrabbling for solid ground in this argument that he’s already lost, with no fucking idea how to gain the upper hand.

And she actually laughs at him, her mouth twisted in a contemptuous sneer. The sound echoes all over the garden, sharply pitched and strangely piteous. “No, because that’s what _really_ matters, doesn’t it? God, I actually thought…the _one_ fucking thing you could have done for me—!”

“Oh, for fuck’s sa—I haven’t done fucking _enough_ for you?!”

“No, you know what, Dan, it turns out you have done _exactly_ enough.” Amy’s voice breaks, and she turns her back on him, retreats further into the cold gloom of the backyard. “Now get the fuck away.”

There’s a second he wants to ignore her—to get in her face and force her look at him, to demand why the hell she even insisted on bringing him out here tonight, if apparently he’s so fucking _useless_ at this whole pointless grieving process thing. To fight until the air is clear between them once again. But the impulse only lasts a second, the length of a match spark, before it gets stamped out by his own rising indignation. 

Because he’s fucking _here,_ isn’t he, he’s been here the whole fucking time, he let himself be pawed at and simpered over by braindead women all night, he’s had to endure more goddamn talks about feelings in this one single week than he ever planned on it in his whole damn life, he’s been here in ways she doesn’t even understand, done things for her that only he can do. And yet they’re still in the same goddamn place, Amy broken and wounded and taking her guilt out on him, because apparently what they have, what they’ve built, _it’s_ _not enough._

“Suit your fucking self.” Dan snarls instead, to the rigid line of Amy’s back, and obeys her without another word.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For my readers, thank you so, so much for your patience. It means the world. I’ve been on the road since basically the end of May, and have had less consistent writing time than usual. There are also now fourteen chapters instead of the original twelve, so I have officially loaded myself up with extra writing work. As this story has grown, my writing approach has evolved to resemble the tortoise, rather than the hare. 
> 
> And as ever, a special platinum gold shout-out to the reviewers. You guys are the best. Even if I don’t have time to reply to every single one, I see them all, read them over and over, and am blown away by your support and interest in this story. The reviews mean more than you know. xx - safflower.


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